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“You don’t feel quite so angry as you did, now do you ?” 





















Brown of Harvard 


By 

Rida Johnson Young 

And 

Gilbert P. Coleman 


Illustrated 


G. P. Putnam’s Sons 
New York and London 
Gbe Tftnlcfcerbocket: ipress 
1908 


Copyright, 1907 

EY 

C-. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 


Published, May, 1907 
Reprinted, May, 1907 ; September, 1907 
February, 1908 ; July, 1908 


as 

■Repl»o©m«*t 


Ube ftnlcfcerbocfcer press, flew jporfe 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. — Madden’s Tutor 1 

II. — A Lesson in Astronomy . .13 

III, - Wilton Ames . . . .29 

IV. - — “ Touching ” Tom Brown . 89 

V,-— Madden and Tom Entertain . 54 

VI. — -Tom Brown’s Little Joke . 73 

VII. — Drowning Misery . . .84 

VIII.— The Trials ok a Head Coach 98 

IX. - To I! BY TO THE RESCUE . .110 

X. — On Probation . . .124 

XL — Victor Colton . . . 135 

XII.— The Story ok Skim polk McLea 151 

XIII. — Marian Thorne . . .173 

XIV. — Tom’s Probation Ended . .187 

XV.- -Colton, the Traitor . .198 

XVI. — The New Stroke Oar . .213 

X VII. — The Race .... 230 
XVIII. — An All-Night Session . . 232 

XIX.— The Worm Turns . . . 283 

XX. — The Recovery ok Wilton Ames 295 
XXL—Why Tubby was Lonesome . 305 

iii 













































/ 
















N 

















ILLUSTRATIONS 


“ You don’t Feel quite so Angry as you 
did, now do you ? ” Frontispiece. 

66 Why, don’t you People Know,” he 
Drawled, “ that this is the First 
of April ? ” 

“ I Tell you,” Insisted Tubby warmly, 
“ it’ s Great ” 

Thurston Renewed his Intimate, Ani¬ 
mated Conversation 

“ I Told Tubby that he need n’t Mind 
being Diplomatic ”... 

Tom Brown ...... 

She Snatched a Bunch of Violets from 
her Waist and Tossed them into his 
Eager, Outstretched Hand . 

“ I can’t Explain. I don’t Want to 
Talk any more about it ! ” . 


PAGE 

80 

88 

116 

124 

190 

256 

274 



BROWN OF HARVARD 


CHAPTER I 

madden’s tutor 

T T was the kind of day in April that in- 
* vites to languor, to close communion 
with nature, to the involuntary manufac¬ 
ture of spring poetry even if one does n’t 
know the difference between a dithyramb 
and an acrostic; the kind of day when you 
feel that it would be too bad to have 
heaven removed to some place remote 
from this heavenly earth; a day of inde¬ 
finable yet certain yearnings and aspira¬ 
tions, of joy in the very passive act of 
existence, when the mildest form of men¬ 
tal exercise makes the labor of Sisy¬ 
phus seem, by comparison, a mere boyish, 
gleeful romp. The very air appeared to 



2 Brown of Harvard 

be laden with the sweet promise of shady 
trees, of rich, velvety green fields, of 
laughing brooks, of the teeming life and 
gladness of a fruitful summer,—a day 
when a man, unless he be the most unrea¬ 
sonable and abnormal of creatures, can 
have no enemies, no thoughts other than 
those of forgiveness and sympathy, and 
the supreme luxury of doing nothing. 

A vague notion of such things as these 
drifted deliciously into the not over 
ready mind of Claxton Madden as he lay 
sprawled—the whole six feet of him—on 
the broad window-seat in the study room 
which he shared at Harvard with his chum 
Tom Brown. He was clad in all the out¬ 
rageous incongruity of a college man 
when enjoying to the full the sweet seclu¬ 
sion of his own apartment. On his feet 
were a pair of faded Turkish slippers, 
their soles almost burnt through owing 
to his habit of resting them in a precarious 
poise on the tip of his andiron, and then 
neglecting, from very inertia, to remove 
them to a more respectful distance when 
the fire got too hot. His trousers were 


Madden’s Tutor 


3 


of the regulation college wide-hip fashion, 
a faint reminder of the “ peg-tops ” of 
the days of our fathers. The upper part 
of his body was encased in a sweater—that 
convenient college garment that so often 
covers a multitude of sins. And yet, in 
spite of the loose fit of his costume, it was 
easy to see that Madden was a young 
man of magnificent physical proportions. 
His head was rather small, almost of the 
Greek mould, and even the looseness of his 
sweater failed to conceal the massive 
shoulders, the thick, powerful neck, the 
immense expanse of chest; and as for the 
extravagantly wide trousers, the simple 
truth is that they were almost fully oc¬ 
cupied by the fine muscular development 
of his hips and thighs and legs. 

The room was typical of university life 
at Cambridge. It was one of those rooms 
designed especially for students, with 
doors leading off to the bedchambers, and 
still another door opening on the halh 
way. Madden and Brown had chummed 
together for three years, and that period 
had been sufficient for them to accumulate 


4 


Brown of Harvard 


even a greater variety than usual of ban¬ 
ners, posters, photographs, sofa-pillows, 
junk of every description, the whole being 
arranged in barbaric profusion. Indeed, 
it seemed to have been their sole ambition, 
in the matter of interior decoration, to 
have as little of the bare wall exposed as 
possible, no matter what the artistic result 
might be. 

It was only four o’clock in the after¬ 
noon, and yet the blinds of the large 
window looking out on the street were 
carefully drawn, and the place was en¬ 
veloped in an untimely, unnatural dusk. 
It was, in fact, so dark that Madden was 
obliged to hold the book he was endeavor¬ 
ing to study close to his eyes, while his lips 
moved from time to time like those of a 
child in the painful effort of learning to 
read, and he hissed gently when he en¬ 
countered an unaccustomed word—which, 
by the way, was a matter of not infrequent 
occurrence. 

It was when he had met one of these 
verbal monsters for, perhaps, the hun¬ 
dredth time, that he suddenly sat up, and, 


Madden’s Tutor 


5 


seizing the book in a vicious grasp, hurled 
it desperately across the room. 

“ Damn astronomy! ” he apostrophized 
the helpless cause of his torture. “ I 
wish it had never been invented. To 
think of my being confined to this hole 
when the boys are out on the river, when 
the air is full of such—such jolly smells. 
It’s a shame to inflict such a thing on a 
healthy college man. Study? Why, who 
could study with the birds chattering away 
to beat the band, and everything so kind 
of—of out-of-doors! I can actually feel 
the leaves growing on the trees. Astron¬ 
omy! The stars! When a man only 
wants to get next to Mother Earth! ” 

He sat still for a moment gazing rue¬ 
fully at the volume he had so unceremoni¬ 
ously spurned from him, and as he lounged 
back luxuriously against the cushions of 
the window-seat there came a sharp rap 
at the door. Madden’s face brightened. 
Here was promise of a change, at all 
events. In his present mood he felt that 
he could even have welcomed a sociable 
dun. 


6 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Come in,” he shouted. 

The door opened slowly, and there en¬ 
tered, first, a thin, scrawny young man, 
whose hair was already beginning to dis¬ 
appear, whose shoulders were stooped, ap¬ 
parently from much study, and who, 
evidently from the same cause, wore spec¬ 
tacles with enormously thick lenses. He 
was the exact antipodes of the hale, 
hearty, athletic figure before him. The 
latter addressed him jovially. 

“ Hello, Cartright,—what’s the game? 
I’m awfully glad to see you, old man. 
Been out trying for the crew, as usual, I 
suppose? ” 

They both laughed at this facetious 
sally, and then Cartright, turning to his 
companion who had followed him into the 
room,— 

“ Madden,” he said, “ this is Thorne— 
Gerald Thorne. You may not know it, 
but he’s in your class—I mean in your 
class at college. Possibly you’ve never 
met him at lectures. You remember you 
told me you wanted somebody to coach 
you in astronomy, so I’ve brought him 


Madden’s Tutor 


7 


around. He stands A 1 and can pull 
you through in spite of yourself. Think 
what a wonder he must be. Thorne, this 
is Claxton Madden, member of the crew, 
whose only weakness is a yearning to con¬ 
sume the midnight oil—olive oil on salads, 
you know.” 

Madden rose and grasped the stran¬ 
ger’s hand. What he saw was a young 
man, with a serious, almost old face, from 
which the joy and bright, wholesome light 
of youth had apparently died out forever, 
if indeed they had ever been present there. 
He was, however, a man of tremendous 
muscular power, a circumstance that was 
manifest despite his somewhat ungainly 
carriage, his ill-fitting clothes, and the 
general embarrassment of his manner, 
He was fully an inch taller than Madden 
himself, and the quiet reserve of his physi¬ 
cal prowess immediately commanded from 
the latter a respectful attention wholly 
dissociated from any admiration he might 
have entertained from Thorne’s superior 
knowledge of astronomy. It is “ phy¬ 
sics,” not astronomy or chemistry, 


8 


Brown of Harvard 


or any other of the varied courses 
in the curriculum, that the true college 
man appreciates. And thus it was 
that Madden, in the enthusiasm for his 
visitor’s powerful physique, began, in 
the most matter-of-fact way, suddenly 
to feel his arms and shoulders, to poke him 
in the ribs—eventually winding up by 
saying- 

“ Why, man, you ’re a credit to the 
university. Great! Say—do you row? 
Have they been after you for the crew? ” 

Thorne smiled, somewhat sadly it 
seemed. 

“ Yes, they have asked me to join the 
squad and go into training, but,—I don’t 
really see where I can get the time. I am 
working my way through college, you 
know.” 

Working his way through college! 
That meant tutoring, and drudgery of 
the worst kind, possibly even waiting on 
table,—an entire cutting out of the ordi¬ 
nary, reasonable pleasures of college life, 
an existence so foreign to Madden’s, that 
the latter could not help regarding his 



Madden’s Tutor 


9 


visitor with a look of curiosity, not um 
mingled with pity. 

At this point, however, they were in¬ 
terrupted by Cartright. 

“ Hello! ” he cried, noticing for the first 
time the drawn curtains, “ what on earth 
are you all shut up for? ” 

Madden gazed at him dismally. 

“ Do you suppose I can devote my 
mind to-” 

“ Your what? ” said Cartright in feigned 
amazement. 

“ That ’ll do for you. Don’t try to be 
funny; my mind , I said, and strange to 
say I ’ve got one left after trying to cram 
all this stuff into it. Do you suppose I 
can devote my mind to astronomy while 
the windows are open, and I can actually 
see the fellows out there on the river? 
My dear fellow, the only place to grind 
in is a dungeon, and I’ve tried to make 
my room as much like the Black Hole of 
Calcutta as possible.” 

“ Oh, nonsense,” returned Cartright 
with a laugh. “ Open up and let the sun 
in. You know the sun’s a part of as- 



IO 


Brown of Harvard 


tronomy. You ’ll find yourself all the 
better for it.” Whereupon he walked de¬ 
liberately to the window, and pulling back 
the curtains, sent the blind up with a 
snap. In an instant the room was flooded 
with the bright, declining sunlight of the 
spring afternoon, while the incessant chat¬ 
tering of birds on the tree directly before 
the window seemed to mock the prisoner 
in his self-immolation. 

For a moment Madden glared at Cart- 
right with a look of surprised annoyance. 

“ I say, old man,” he ventured at length, 
“ you ’ve got a nerve—spoiling my dun¬ 
geon, and interrupting my studies. How 
on earth do you ever expect me to pass 
my exams if you queer me this way? ” 
Then he rushed eagerly over to the win¬ 
dow, and, leaning on the seat, stretched 
his muscular frame through the casement. 

“ Oh, just look at it! ” he ejaculated in 
a rapture, while he filled his lungs with the 
delicious aroma of the atmosphere. “ Just 
look at it! And to think I can’t even go 
out for a little toddle! ” 

Cartright laughed again. 

“ If you had n’t toddled so much this 


Madden’s Tutor 


11 

year you would n’t have to stay in your 
dungeon and cram now.” 

Madden drew back into the room and 
placed himself by the side of his friend, 
so that the difference in their physical 
“ make-ups ” was brought out in almost 
ridiculous contrast. 

“ Old man,” he said, as he smoothed 
Cartright’s meagre, sandy hair, “ you 
know I really believe it would do you good 
if you could toddle a little bit more out¬ 
doors yourself. You ’re not getting the 
full advantage of a college education. O 
Lord!” he went on impulsively, “why 
are things so unevenly distributed in this 
world? Now, if you only had a little of 
my chest and arms, and I had a little of 
your—of your-” 

“ Brains,” supplied Cartright. “ Yes, 
—I know what you mean. Some fellows 
are all intellect and no muscle; others are 
all muscle and no—er—er—no offence, 
old man. Well, I must be going. Thorne, 
I wish you joy with your brilliant pupil. 
You ’ve got an excellent chance to 
squeeze blood out of a turnip.” 


12 


Brown of Harvard 


And in his exit Cartright escaped only 
by a hair’s breadth the tennis racquet 
which Madden had hurled at him with re¬ 
markable dexterity, considering that he 
had taken so quick an aim. 


CHAPTER II 

A LESSON IN ASTRONOMY 

J\ /l ADDEN walked over to the door, 
* * * and picking up the racquet tossed 
it on the top shelf of a book-case, thereby 
narrowly imperilling a small plaster cast 
of Venus de Milo. Then turning toward 
his companion he asked somewhat mourn¬ 
fully, as if he dreaded the inquisition that 
was to come- 

“ Why don’t you sit down, old man? 
Pardon me if I get a little violent at times 
—I ’ll come out all right in the end.” 

Thorne took a seat near the study table 
in very obvious embarrassment. This 
fellow Madden was not at all of his “ set.” 
He had heard of him as a rich young man, 
inclined to be rather wild, except when he 
was in training for the crew,—a man 
whose sphere of college life had never 
13 



i4 


Brown of Harvard 


once come into contact with his own. As 
Cartright had hinted, though they were 
classmates, such is the wide diversity of 
existence at Harvard, he had, to the best 
of his knowledge, never seen him before, 
a circumstance that would cause a Har¬ 
vard man of a generation ago to open his 
eyes with wonder, if not with disapproval. 

Madden threw himself dejectedly into 
an arm-chair and tilted his feet into their 
favorite position on the andiron. 

“ Well, fire away, Governor,” he said. 
“ Let’s have the tooth out quick, and if 
you think it ’s going to hurt much, just 
give me gas.” 

The tutor drew a note-book and foun¬ 
tain pen from his pocket, and after care¬ 
fully adjusting the latter, began, in a 
manner more embarrassed than ever. 

“ I—a—may I ask how far you have 
gone in this year’s work? ” 

Madden stared at him blankly. 

“Gone? How far I have gone?” 

“Yes. What was the last lecture you 
attended ? ” 

Madden looked at his companion again 


A Lesson in Astronomy 15 

sharply, to see if perchance these appar¬ 
ently innocent words were the vehicle for 
some gibe. Thorne’s manner, however, 
was ingenuousness itself. He was very 
evidently in earnest. 

“ The last lecture? Why, my dear fel¬ 
low, I have n’t gone to any. What do 
you suppose I would want you here for if 
I had been prowling around the lecture- 
rooms all through the year? My dear 
chap, that’s what I sent to you for — to 
throw those lectures into me that I’ve 
missed. I want you to boil the whole 
thing down into a nutshell,” he added. 
“ You are to give me the dose in capsule 
form.” 

Thorne gazed at him in still greater 
wonder. Was it possible for a man to go 
nearly through a term without attending 
a single lecture? He recalled his own 
bitter struggles, his sacrifices to get to 
college, and how punctiliously he had 
taken advantage of every opportunity af¬ 
forded in the curriculum. 

Madden, noticing Thorne’s expression 
of genuine surprise, went on: 


16 Brown of Harvard 

“If I had the faintest idea about all 
these azimuths and zeniths and things, and 
all that rot, don’t you suppose I’d be out 
imbibing the atmosphere, instead of 
chinning with you? My dear fellow, my 
knowledge of astronomy is surprising, 
from one point of view, anyway. I 
really did make an effort to read up at 
the beginning of the year—got as far 
as 4 right ascension,’—you know it comes 
under the definitions on the first page. 
Well, sir, I couldn’t for the life of me 
make out what it meant, and when I went 
to the instructor on the quiet, and asked 
him what was the difference between a 
right ascension and a left ascension, he 
gave me the ha, ha, right to my face. He 
did, on the level.” 

At this delightful confession, Thorne’s 
sombre face lighted up with an apprecia¬ 
tive smile. 

“ Oh, I tell you,” continued Madden, 
with a somewhat virtuous indignation, 
“ if I’d known there was so much mathe¬ 
matics in astronomy I’d never have 
elected it. I thought it was a cinch,—a 


A Lesson in Astronomy 17 

sort of fortune-telling business, you know. 
4 Born under the planet Venus you will 
be loved by a light-haired lady,’ and all 
that kind of thing. I never dreamed 
what I was going up against. But come 
on, I’m doing all the talking. Let’s get 
to work.” 

Thorne settled himself into a serious 
and didactic attitude. 

44 Well,” he said, adopting the dry, even 
tone of the pedagogue, and plunging in 
medias res, 44 following the mathematical 
investigations of Professor George Scan- 
nel, it is found that binary stars will tend 
to separate. Inertia will cause the 
tidal protuberances to lag behind so 
that--” 

44 Hold on! ” interrupted Madden with 
intense seriousness. 44 4 Binary stars! ’ 
4 Tidal protuberances! ’ Say, old fellow, 
you must n’t—you really must n’t. I 
can’t stand for it. Really, seriously, I 
don’t care to know anything deep about 
the subject; deep, you understand. Why, 
if I got to chinning about binary protu¬ 
berances the fellows would never forgive 



18 Brown of Harvard 

me. They would think I was trying to 
lord it over them. My idea is to get 
a few handy catchwords that ’ll make a 
good show on paper—see? ” 

Thorne gazed at him blankly. 

“ Catchwords? I can’t say that I do.” 

At this juncture a strident voice floated 
in from the streets: 

“Oh—h—h—! Clax!” 

Madden sprang out of his seat, upset 
the andiron, and rushed over to the 
window. 

“ Hello! ” he exclaimed, “ there’s Van! 
Hi there! ” he shouted, as he thrust 
his body eagerly through the window- 
frame, “what you want?” 

“ Come on out! ” demanded the voice. 

“ Can’t do it. Got a 4 grind ’ up here 
stuffing me in astronomy.” 

“Any good!” inquired the voice 
solicitously. 

“ Oh, pretty good,” replied the other, 
wiggling his feet up and down as if he 
would like to spring from the window. 
“ Kind of long-winded, though. I can’t 
get in a word edgewise.” 


A Lesson in Astronomy 19 


Angered, mortified, Thorne half rose 
from his seat, and then as quickly sub¬ 
sided. For somehow, despite his pupil’s 
brusque manner, there was something 
about him that was engaging—something 
that was genuine. Thorne could not 
bring himself to believe that this whole¬ 
some, hearty young fellow could be in¬ 
tentionally rude. 

“ Well, so long,” replied the voice from 
the street, “ sorry you can’t come out.” 

“ So long,” replied Madden. He 
turned from the window, then rushed back 
and once more thrust his head out pre¬ 
cariously through the casement. 

“ Say, Van, what kind of time did you 
make up the river to-day? ” 

“Good!” was the answer. “Four 
seconds better than yesterday. We ’ll do 
those Englishmen to a turn when they 
come over. So long, old man. Awfully 
sorry you could n’t be with us.” 

Madden returned to his arm-chair and 
threw himself into it with an air of the 
most abject misery. 

“ Now, look here, old sport,” he said 


20 


Brown of Harvard 


petulantly, “ you ’ve got to get a move on 
you. I can’t waste my time like this.” 

Instead of indignation, which perhaps 
he had a right to feel, Thorne gazed at 
his hopeful pupil with a most distinct sen¬ 
sation of astonishment. 

“ Well—er—” he said after a few 
moments of confused silence, “ suppose I 
give you a sort of—a—a—table of the 
different binary stars, with a few words 
of description after each? ” 

“ Bully! ” replied Madden, “ that’s the 
stuff—just enough to make a nice little 
show without learning too much astron¬ 
omy. Wait a minute, though, I’ve lost 
my lead-pencil.” He groped for a while 
in a mass of books and papers which he 
had previously swept from the study table 
to the floor, and eventually succeeded in 
resurrecting a miserable stub of a lead- 
pencil and a few loose sheets of paper. 
“ Now, let her go Gallagher! ” 

“ Well, in the first place,” began 
Thorne solemnly. But he was not des¬ 
tined to go farther. There was suddenly 
the sound of loud singing and tramping 


21 


A Lesson in Astronomy 

on the stairway, the door burst open un¬ 
ceremoniously, and three college men 
entered, their hands on each other’s should¬ 
ers, in true penitentiary lock-step fashion, 
and chanting, to the old familiar tune, 

Tom Brown’s body is alive and feeling good, 
Tom Brown’s body, here’s a fact that’s 
understood, 

Tom Brown’s body’s got a head that’s made 
of wood, 

As we go marching on! 

Madden looked upon his visitors with 
a cheerful disgust. 

“ Get out of here, you yaps. Can’t 
you see I’m working? ” 

The intruders suddenly stopped, and 
stared at him in finely simulated wonder. 
Then, almost as if they had rehearsed the 
act, they dropped to the floor in a line, 
one upon the other. Madden snatched 
a book off the table and hurled it at them 
viciously. It struck the leader on the 
back of the head, but, paying no attention 
to this delicate reception, they rose simul¬ 
taneously to all fours and began to march 
around Madden and Thorne chanting the 


22 


Brown of Harvard 


words, “ Grind, grind,—grind, grind, 
grind,” meantime keeping excellent time 
with their hands and feet. 

The light of combat danced in Mad¬ 
den’s eyes. Springing once more out of 
his chair he jumped on the prostrate line 
of his visitors and began to pummel them 
right and left. 

“ I ’ll teach you, Happy Thurston, and 
you, Tubby Anderson, and you, Jean de 
Reszke, to come butting into my room 
making rough-house when a man’s work¬ 
ing,” he exclaimed, pounding each of his 
visitors as he mentioned his name. 

“Ouch!” exclaimed he who had been 
punched as Happy Thurston. “ Remem¬ 
ber, we ’re your guests.” 

In the midst of the confusion there was 
heard the “ Kronk, kronk ” of an auto¬ 
mobile horn under the window. 

“ It’s the Kid,” cried “ Jean de 
Reszke,” better known to his parents as 
Warren Pierce—a young man who had 
received his nickname owing to the fact 
that he possessed a high tenor voice and 
sang on the glee club. All hands sprang 


A Lesson in Astronomy 23 

from the floor and made a rush for the 
window, leaning far out and leaving no¬ 
thing visible to the somewhat discomfited 
Thorne but a row of wildly struggling 
legs. 

“ Hi, Kid! ” yelled they of the legs — 
“ Come on up, we ’re paying you a visit! ” 
There was a sound of singing on the 
steps and in the hallway outside, and in 
a moment the door was flung open, re¬ 
vealing a young man of medium height, 
thickset, with a handsome, happy, almost 
careless countenance, and a wealth of 
curly hair which cropped up round about 
the edges of a wofully unsizable cap. 

“ Hello, fellows,” he cried in a tone of 
jolly welcome to his visitors, who had 
emerged once more wholly into the room 
—*“ glad to see you. My, how you’ve 

grown—sideways—Tubby, since - ” 

But here Madden broke in. 

“ Oh, say now, fellows, on the level,” he 
said sinking once more into his arm-chair, 
“ I’ve got to get down to work. Won’t 
you please, please go? Clear out, won’t 
you?” 



24 Brown of Harvard 

Tom turned to his chum, his blue eyes 
fairly beaming with glee. 

“ Well, old man,” he said, “ if you really 
have to work—if there’s no way out of it, 
why, I won’t tell you what I came to tell 
you. No, it wouldn’t be fair to disturb 
him with the news—would it, boys? ” 

“News? What news?” asked Mad¬ 
den seriously. And then, his thoughts re¬ 
verting to the first and chief object of his 
solicitude— 

“Is there anything the matter with the 
crew? ” 

“ No—the crew’s all right,” replied his 
chum reassuringly, “ but—but say, boys 
—is n’t it a shame he’s got to work when 
—say, Clax, old horse,” he added, break¬ 
ing off suddenly, “ would you mind re¬ 
tiring to your room while you perform 
this miraculous studying stunt of yours? 
I’m expecting some girls to tea.” 

“ Oh, look here, ^m,” said Madden in 
a tone of genuine disgust, “ you don’t 
mean to say you’ve invited a bunch of 
women up here when you know I did n’t 
want to be disturbed?” 


A Lesson in Astronomy 25 

“Well/’ responded Tom solemnly, 
“ the truth is I happened to meet Miss 
Sinclair on Brattle Street and she looked 

so thirsty that I- 

Madden sprang out of his chair, his 
face glowing with delight, in marked 
contrast to his former expression of 
despair. 

“ No—did you though, really, Tom? 
Edith? Why did n’t you say so at first? ” 
44 Why, my dear fellow, you were so 
eager to grind, you know, that I thought 
it would be very inconsiderate.” 

44 Oh, grind your grandmother,” 
snapped back Madden, beginning to tug 
at his sweater preparatory to pulling it 
off. 44 Which way did she go? ” 

44 Go?” replied Tom innocently. 44 Why, 
I’m sure I don’t know. It may have 
been east,—but come to think of it, per¬ 
haps she went west.” 

By this time Ma 1 ^ * had succeeded in 
getting his sweaters $irly over his head, 
and, with an inarticulate reply that did 
not appear to be altogether complimen¬ 
tary, groped his way into his bedroom. 



26 


Brown of Harvard 


“You needn’t be in such a rush, old 
man,” Tom cried out after him. “ They 
won’t be here for a good half-hour. She’s 
going to stop for Mrs. Ames and 
Evelyn.” 

“ I say, Tom,” said Thurston, who dur¬ 
ing the past few minutes had been loung¬ 
ing luxuriously on the window-seat, one 
knee crossed over the other and his hands 
clasped in Sybaritic repose under his 
head, “ we don’t want to butt into your 
tea fest. The truth is, we came up to 
ask you if we could have your benzine 
buggy for half an hour or so, if you ’re 
not going to use it.” 

“ Sure thing,” replied Tom cordially; 
“ but don’t you try to play any Vander¬ 
bilt cup stunts. You know, last time—” 

“ Oh, that’s all right. We ’ll be good. 
Much obliged, old man. Come along, 
fellows,” whereupon Thurston and his 
companions hustled precipitately out of 
the room, to the tune of the national an¬ 
them set to appropriate words for auto- 
mobiling purposes. 

Scarcely had the door closed when it 


A Lesson in Astronomy $7 

opened again, and a young man, pale, 
haggard, bearing very evident marks of 
dissipation, stepped slowly into the room. 

“ Hello, Ames,” greeted Tom cheer¬ 
fully, at the same time studying his visitor 
curiously. “You look a little seedy. 
What’s up?” 

Ames glanced meaningly toward 
Thorne, who, standing in the half-obscu¬ 
rity of the fireplace, had remained un¬ 
observed ever since Brown’s entrance into 
the room. Tom, following Ames’s glance, 
saw the stranger for the first time. 

“Why—what the deuce?” he said,— 
“ I did n’t know you were here. Who— 
who are you? ’’ 

Poor Thorne felt himself fairly over¬ 
whelmed with embarrassment. 

“ I—I was waiting to see—” he stam¬ 
mered,— : “ do you think Mr. Madden will 
want me any more? ” 

“Will want you? What on earth 
should he want you for? ” 

Thorne shifted his position uneasily, 
clutching the edge of the mantel in a 
nervous grasp. 


28 


Brown of Harvard 


“ My name is Thorne. I was asked— 
was employed by Mr. Madden to coach 
him in astronomy.” 

“Oh,” replied Tom carelessly, “no; I 
guess he won’t have any more use for you 
to-day.” And then turning to the other, 
he inquired: 

“ Well, Ames, what can I do for you? ” 

There was a rudeness in his manner, un¬ 
intentional to be sure, but still a rudeness, 
and it stung this sensitive, shy, power¬ 
ful young man to the quick. And as he 
left the room it was with a feeling of 
wounded pride, of bitterness,—of deep 
resentment. 


CHAPTER III 

WILTON AMES 

‘CAY, Kid,” said Ames, as he sank into 
^ a chair by the study table, “ I’m in 
an awful hole.” 

“ That’s about the tenth hole you ’ve 
struck this year,” returned Tom, with a 
tinge of reproof in his tone. “You ought 
to be careful how you walk.” 

“ Oh, hang it all, Kid,” replied Ames, 
in a voice that was almost a whine, “ don't 
be so cold-blooded. I should n’t have come 
to you if I had n’t known how fond 
you were of my mother and sister. I tell 
you, man, I’m desperate! You fellows 
with rich fathers don’t know- 

“ Oh, we don’t, don’t we? ” interrupted 
Tom, “ we don’t know what it is to face 
a cold, unfeeling world,—to know the bit¬ 
ter sting of poverty emphasized by the out- 

29 



30 


Brown of Harvard 


rageous flings of a taunting parent. Just 
you listen to this ”—he took a letter from 
his pocket—“it’s from the governor: 

“ 4 My dear son: In answer to my re¬ 
peated questions as to what you intended 
to do on leaving college you at last an¬ 
nounce that you will follow your literary 
inclination and write for money. Well, 
allow me to say that your training at 
Harvard thus far should have made you 
very proficient in that respect, as you have 
done practically nothing else but write for 
money for the last three years. Twice 
you have overdrawn your account,’ and so 
on. Now, don’t you think,” said Tom, 
endeavoring somewhat futilely to sum¬ 
mon up an expression of chagrin, “ don’t 
you think that is cruel treatment to a 
studious, provident, talented offspring? ” 

“ Oh, hang it all, Kid,” replied Ames, 
with some impatience. “ I know it’s very 
funny, and all that sort of thing, but I 
tell you, man ”—and here his voice qua¬ 
vered, and the pallid, drawn look on his 
face became suddenly accentuated— 44 1 
tell you I’m—I’m desperate,” 


Wilton Ames 


3i 


And with these words Ames buried his 
face in his hands, and, leaning on the 
table, sobbed convulsively. 

Tom’s whole demeanor changed in an 
instant. Stepping quickly to the young 
man’s side he spoke to him solicitously, 
tenderly, almost as a woman would speak 
to a child in distress. 

“Ames, I—oh, I say, old man, brace 
up. I’m very sorry. I’m awfully 
sorry. I hope I have n’t hurt your feel¬ 
ings. Of course I ’ll help you out if I 
can. Come, now, tell me all about it— 
what’s the row? ” 

It was several moments before Ames 
could collect himself sufficiently to 
speak. 

“ Oh, Kid,” he said at length in a voice 
so choked as to be scarcely articulate, 
“ it’s—it’s everything. I know I have 
been a selfish brute—I ’ve always thought 
of myself first, and—and you see what it 
has brought me to. I’m a wreck—a 
poor, miserable, worthless wreck.” 

“ Oh, come now, Ames,” said Tom 
kindly, placing his hand on the other’s 


32 


Brown of Harvard 


shoulder, “don’t feel so badly about it; 
brace up; you’ve got the stuff in you, I 
know. Now, what is it? ” 

“ It’s everything, Tom — everything. 
I don’t dare to tell you how bad it is. In 
the first place, it’s money. I lost a 
hundred dollars to Anson last month, and 
you know what a shark he is-” 

“ Oh, yes—I know him,” replied Tom 
cheerfully—“ the kind of fellow who pos¬ 
sesses a peculiar gift of never losing, and 
who never has but one cigarette in his 
case.” 

“ He says he ’ll go to my mother, Tom, 
and you know she can’t help me.” And 
then, his voice resuming the old whine that 
seemed habitual to him, he went on: 

“ Here we are, my mother, my sister, 
and myself, one of the oldest and best 
families in Cambridge, living in an ex¬ 
clusive neighborhood among the best 
people, and always dogged by that hor¬ 
rible nightmare of trying to keep up 
appearances on my mother’s paltry 
income.” 

Even Tom’s good nature had some dif- 



Wilton Ames 


33 


ficulty in countenancing this exhibition of 
selfishness. 

“ Yes,” he said dryly, “ it must be 
rather hard—on the women.” 

“ Oh, don’t, Kid, don’t rub it in. I 
know I owe you a lot of money already, 
but if you ’ll help me out this time-” 

Here he broke off weakly, once more 
leaning his head on his hands. 

Tom gazed down at him for a moment 
pityingly, then shrugging his shoulders 
walked over to a desk at the side of the 
room and began rummaging about among 
the pigeon holes, at the same time mutter¬ 
ing, half to himself: 

“ Where the devil’s my check book 
gone?” 

“ Tom! ” exclaimed Ames hoarsely. 

Tom turned sharply around on his 
visitor. There was something in his voice 
that denoted a misery far more intense 
than that caused by the mere lack of 
money. 

“ Tom,” he said rapidly, impetuously, 
as if he had summoned up his strength for 
a supreme effort and dreaded lest his 



34 


Brown of Harvard 


nerve fail him. “ I would n’t tell any- 
* body but you. But I must tell you, Kid 
—you must help me. You remember 
that awfully pretty girl from the South, 
Marian Thorne, I introduced you to? 
Well, she—she-.” 

At this point, however, there was an in¬ 
terruption. For Madden, partly dressed, 
poked his head out of his room, razor in 
one hand and towel in the other. 

“ I say, Kid, what do you use after 
shaving? ” 

“Courtplaster,”returned Tom promptly. 

“Ah, don’t be funny. Go and get me 
some bay rum, there’s a good fellow. 
I’m all out.” 

Tom, who in the meantime had miracu¬ 
lously recovered the object of his search, 
tossed it on the table and disappeared in 
his own room. 

Ames, left alone, absently picked up 
the check-book, which had been thrown al¬ 
most under his very face, and opening it, 
idly turned over the leaves. Suddenly 
his attitude underwent a complete change, 
and he gazed at the book with a sharp 
intake of the breath, as if fascinated. 



Wilton Ames 


35 


Then with a muttered exclamation he 
threw it from him, but as quickly recov¬ 
ered it, tore out two or three of the blank 
pages and thrust them into his pocket, 
just as Tom re-entered the study. 

“ I’m sorry, old man,” Tom shouted 
to Madden, “ but I’m all out of bay rum 
myself. Got a little of the Jamaica 
variety, if you ’d like to apply it 
externally.” 

“Go to the devil!” was the cheerful 
response from the innermost penetralia of 
Madden’s bedroom. 

“ Oh, I say, Ames,” said Tom, ap¬ 
proaching the table and observing the 
agitation in his visitor’s manner, “ you ’re 
all unnerved. Why don’t you cut out 
booze, old man? ” 

“ I have n’t had but one drink to-day, 
honest, Kid,” replied Ames, with a des¬ 
perate effort at self-control. 

“ Well,” said Tom as he seated himself 
at the table and dipped his pen in the 
ink, “ how much do you need? ” 

“ I—I think fifty would stand Anson 
off.” 

And as Tom proceeded, somewhat la- 


36 


Brown of Harvard 


boriously, for a college man, to write out 
the check, Ames rose quietly from his seat 
and looked over the other’s shoulder, ob¬ 
serving with painful minuteness every 
curve and stroke of the pen,—noticing 
especially the manner in which the name 
was signed at the bottom. 

Tom, when he had finished, turned ab¬ 
ruptly around, and saw tht eager, anxious 
expression on his friend’s face, but, in the 
innocence of his own guileless heart, at¬ 
tributed it to another, a wholly different 
cause. 

“ I can make it more, if you really need 
it, Ames.” 

“ No, no,” replied Ames hurriedly. 
“ I owe you too much already. Thank 
you very much, Kid,—I ’ll pay you some 
day. I swear I will. I must go now. 
Colton’s waiting for me, and I-” 

“ Now, look here, Ames,” broke in Tom 
with considerable impatience, “ why don’t 
you cut that fellow Colton out? I don’t 
like to ‘ knock ’ a man, but they tell me 
there was n’t a fellow in his class who 
would have anything to do with him when 



Wilton Ames 


37 


he was in college. He—but there is no 
use repeating what he did then. You 
know what he is now,—simply a shark, 
hanging about looking for fool 4 Fresh- 
ies ’ who think it’s real college life to 
drink and gamble and make fools of them¬ 
selves generally. He makes his living off 
the weakness of fellows like-•” 

44 Like me,” interrupted Ames dole¬ 
fully. 44 Oh, say it. But, Kid, Colton’s 
stood by me many times when I was down 
on my luck, and the other fellows 
would n’t have—oh, Kid, it’s mean in me 
to talk this way, especially just after 
you’ve been so good. But I’m fearfully 
upset to-day, everything has gone wrong 
with me.” 

He made his way to the door, and, 
turning around, said, in a voice strangely 
broken, his face more haggard and worn 
than ever: 

44 You’ve been awfully kind to me, 
Kid. I should n’t have said what I did— 
but I—I don’t think I’m quite myself. 
Good-bye, old man.” 

44 Good-bye.” 



33 


Brown of Harvard 


And when the door had closed Tom 
dropped into a chair by the fireplace and 
proceeded to ruminate aloud. 

“ I wonder what he meant about that 
pretty Southern girl, Miss Thorne? I 
wonder-He stared long and re¬ 

flectively at the one andiron that still 
remained standing upright, and then, ac¬ 
cording to his habit, the habit of a good- 
natured, unsuspecting man who is always 
disposed to think the best, even of his 
enemies, shrugged his shoulders, and, dis¬ 
missing the subject from his thoughts, 
leaned back in his chair with a comfort¬ 
able, satisfied sigh. 

“Any one would think,” he muttered 
softly to himself, “ that Clax and I were 
holding an all-day reception. And I 
wonder, by the way, when the girls will 
be here? Oh, Evelyn, Evelyn, what a 
corker you are! ” 



CHAPTER IV 

“ TOUCHING ” TOM BROWN 

CARCELY had Tom drifted into 



^ his delightful re very when there 
came a modest knock at the door. 

“What, again?” exclaimed Tom, but 
without changing his comfortable posi¬ 
tion. “ It can’t be the girls, for they 
would break in as if the house were afire. 
I wonder if it’s another 4 touch ’ ? But 
no, Ames is the only one—Come in! ” 

The door opened softly, and on its 
threshold stood once more the meagre out¬ 
lines of his previous visitor, Cartright, 
thin-haired, stoop-shouldered, and bespec¬ 
tacled as was his wont. 

“ Say, Brown, Madden, are you here? ” 
he inquired, seeing no one, as Tom was 
completely buried in the deep, absorbing 
recesses of the arm-chair. 


39 


40 


Brown of Harvard 


Tom strained his neck so that his head 
appeared around the back of the chair. 

“ Hello, Cartright,” he exclaimed jovi¬ 
ally, “ come in and take a seat. I 
have n’t seen you for half an hour.” 

Cartright smiled. 

44 Yes, I know it’s pretty tough on you, 
old man, for me to stay away so long—but 
I came to see Madden. Is he in? ” 

In involuntary reply to this question 
Madden stepped from his bedroom, where 
he had evidently been devoting consider¬ 
able attention to his toilet, for he was very 
obviously 44 dressed up.” He wore white 
shoes, a white cravat, a light flannel coat, 
white trousers, and in every way, as far as 
outward accoutrement went, appeared as 
the very harbinger of spring. 

44 Hello, Cartright,—glad to see you 
again. Say, boys, how do I look? ” 

44 Great! ” replied Tom enthusiastically, 
44 you ’ll make her fairly miserable if she 
thinks she can’t possess you all at once in 
a lump.” 

“Well, maybe you’re right, Kid,” re¬ 
plied Madden, rather dubiously. 44 1 


“Touching” Tom Brown 41 


wish I could have worn my sweater, 
though. Sweaters are awfully fetching, 
don’t you think? I ’ve got a notion the 
girls like them tremendously.” 

“ Yes,” replied Tom laughing, “ I 
think Edith is awfully fond of them, es¬ 
pecially when they are covered with gaso¬ 
line, the way yours was when you tried to 
fill the tank on our last country trip. Oh, 
it was a beaut! ” 

“ Oh, dry up, Kid; you’ve always got 
to make a man feel like an It. Well, I 
must be off, fellows—I’ve got to find the 
ladies.” 

“ Hold up a minute, Madden,” cried 
Cartright, stepping into the centre of the 
room, and taking a note-book and pencil 
from his pocket. “As secretary for the 
Lend-a-Hand Club-” 

At this introduction both Tom and 
Madden threw up their hands, and the 
latter sank on the window seat in an atti¬ 
tude of abject dismay. 

“ How much? ” inquired Madden, with 
mournful foreboding. 

Cartright, taking no notice of this con- 



Brown of Harvard 


42 

certed pantomime,went on imperturbably: 

“ I came across a case of actual starva¬ 
tion the other day. Poor fellow from the 
South; parents ignorant mountain people 
in Tennessee. He was full of ambition 
—got a common school education, some¬ 
how,—taught a country school—educated 
his only sister, and when the old folks died 
sold out the little place for a few hundreds, 
and with his sister came up here to work 
his way through Harvard.” 

“ Well,” said Madden in a tone of mani¬ 
fest vexation, “ why on earth did n’t he 
stay at home and work on his farm? I 
tell you this education proposition is get¬ 
ting entirely too common. First thing 
you know we ’ll have all the farmers and 
mechanics in the country swarming to 
college and working their way through, 
and then— ” he stopped for a moment 
evidently seriously contemplating this 
complex problem in political economy— 
“ and then—who the deuce is going to 
raise chickens and wheat and cotton and 
all that sort of thing? I’m tired of hav¬ 
ing my leg pulled in order to help ambi- 


u Touching’" Tom Brown 43 


tious backwoodsmen who come here with 
fifty cents and a writing pad and expect 
to get through college on them! ” 

Still Cartright paid no attention to the 
interruption. He was a genius at get¬ 
ting subscriptions, and would have made 
a success in life equally well as a mission¬ 
ary, a college president, or a fakir at a 
county fair. It was almost impossible to 
refrain from handing him over money 
when, as the college men said, he began 
his “ spiel.” 

“ He entered his sister at a school,” he 
continued glibly, “ gave her most of the 
money left of their joint inheritance, which 
enables her to live in a good boarding 
place, and then hid himself away in a gar¬ 
ret on Sacramento Street. I found him 
there the other day in a positively starv¬ 
ing condition. He had lived for three 
days on oatmeal and water.” 

“ Oh, I sa-ay,” interjected Tom with 
his accustomed drawl, “ cut it mild, will 
you, old horse? Oatmeal and water,—• 
that’s too much, too little, I mean.” 

“ No, it’s a fact,” went on Cartright, 


44 


Brown of Harvard 


waving his arms energetically, and begin¬ 
ning to pace up and down before the 
others as if he were addressing them from 
a platform. “ I found him mighty sensi¬ 
tive and stand-offish at first, but I got 
round him after a while and fed him up 
and procured him some work to do. 
Maybe you would n’t believe it, but do 
you know who he is? ” 

“Who?” inquired Tom and Madden 
in chorus. 

“ Why, it’s that fellow Thorne, whom 
I brought around to tutor you to-day, 
Madden. He needs any such little help 
badly. By the way, I trust you paid him, 
did n’t you? ” 

A look of deep chagrin spread over 
Madden’s face, which up to this time had 
worn a distinctly bored expression. 

“ Why, no, I have n’t, Cartright. I’m 
deucedly sorry, but the truth is, when 
Tom came in here and told me about— 
about the girls I forgot all about him. It 
was rotten rude of me, I admit. But, 
hang it all, a fellow has so much to think 
of. Say, put me down for twenty dol- 


“Touching” Tom Brown 45 

lars, and that’s all I’ll give, see?” 
Whereupon he sprang up and left the 
room, banging the door behind him. 
Cartright’s eyes, however, shone with 
pleasure—the pleasure of having helped 
a fellow-creature in distress, and also of 
having made a successful “ spiel.” Hav¬ 
ing entered the name and amount care¬ 
fully in his note-book, he turned and gazed 
at Tom searchingly. 

“ Well? ” he asked. 

“Well?” replied Tom coldly. 

“ I presume you don’t feel inclined 
to imitate Madden’s example this time, 
eh?” 

Tom slowly rose from his seat and 
stepped to a cupboard on the wall, from 
which he proceeded to transfer a tea¬ 
kettle and lamp to the table. 

“ No,” he drawled, “ I can’t say that 
I do.” 

“ Oh, very well,” said Cartright mov¬ 
ing toward the door, “ there’s no reason 
why you should if you don’t feel so in¬ 
clined.” He hesitated a moment, and 
looked yearningly at Tom, who was still 


46 


Brown of Harvard 


fussing with the tea-things, and then went 
on, a melodramatic pathos in his voice: 

“ He was actually starving, Brown. 
Really, no joke—oatmeal and water. But 
of course if you won’t, why, you won’t, 
and there’s an end to the matter.” Hav¬ 
ing finished this subtle appeal he pro¬ 
ceeded to fumble with the door-knob. 

“ Oh, I say,” drawled Tom, “ was he 
really? Now, don’t be in a hurry, Cart- 
right, you don’t give a fellow a chance. 
Just wait a minute, will you? ” 

He went into his room and immedi¬ 
ately reappeared with his wash-pitcher, 
from which he filled the tea-kettle. Then 
having restored the pitcher he came back 
and began to adjust the lamp. 

“As I was saying when you inter¬ 
rupted me,” he said in his slow, deliberate 
fashion, “ I don’t feel like imitating Mad¬ 
den’s example, because I don’t see what 
a few scattered donations like that are 
going to do if the man is as poor as you 
say. Must be something pretty decent 
in the fellow to take care of his sister like 
that.” He drew back from the table and. 


“Touching” Tom Brown 47 


thrusting his hands into his trousers 
pocket, leaned against the mantel. 

“ I tell you, Cartright,” he said, as if 
suddenly inspired, “ I Ve got a better 
scheme. Suppose you make him a weekly 
allowance, whatever you think he can 
scrape along on, and—and charge it up 
to me? ” 

Even in his wildest dreams Cartright 
had not conjured up such generosity as 
this. He gazed at Tom in amazement, 
fearing first that he was joking, but Tom’s 
perfectly serious face showed that he 
was undoubtedly in earnest. Cartright 
started toward him with outstretched 
hands. 

“Brown—you can’t mean it! Why, 
that is the noblest-” 

“Ah, cut it out,” cried Tom in deep dis¬ 
gust. “ I guess I don’t deserve so much 
credit, after all. The truth of the matter 
is that when this fellow Thorne was here a 
while ago I treated him like a dog, I’m 
afraid. Yes, I acted like a brute—like 
a downright cad; almost told him to get 
out of the room. So you see I’m just 



48 Brown of Harvard 

easing up my conscience a bit, that’s 
all.” 

“ Well,” returned Cartright after mak¬ 
ing the inevitable memorandum in his 
note-book, “all I can say is you ’re doing 
a mighty generous act, and Thorne is just 
the kind of fellow that will take proper 
advantage of it. More than that, he ’ll be 
eternally grateful to you and I feel sure 
he ’ll pay you back, too. He’s just that 
sort of a fellow.” 

“ Now, look here, Cartright,” cried 
Tom in very genuine alarm, “ the only 
condition upon which I will do this thing 
is that you will not tell Thorne a word 
about it, nor any one else, for that matter. 
Man alive! If I keep on getting known 
here at college as a bona fide, sure-thing 
Easy Mark, my father will think I’m 
running a harem, and then it ’ll all be off. 
Give me your word, old man, that you 
won’t tell a soul of this offer.” 

“Well,” said Cartright reluctantly, as 
he extended his hand, “ I ’ll promise 
if you wish, of course. But really, 
Brown- 



“Touching” Tom Brown 49 

“Ah, forget it, I tell you! Don’t let 
me hear any more about it.” 

Cartright walked over to the door, 
opened it, stepped out into the hall, and 
then poked his head back into the room, 
his colorless complexion, sparse hair, and 
eyes peering through the thick lenses of 
his spectacles causing him to look almost 
like a creature from another planet. 

“Anyhow,” he said, as a parting shot, 
“ I insist on it, it’s a blame fine thing 
you ’re doing, all the same.” 

In exasperation Tom ran to the fire¬ 
place, seized the poker, and rushed across 
to the door, which Cartright with a laugh 
of derision banged in his face. Bent on 
revenge Tom twisted the knob and opened 
the door with a jerk and—almost thrust 
the poker into the face of a remarkably 
pretty girl who stood, apparently in great 
embarrassment, on the threshold. 

Tom drew back in astonishment and al¬ 
lowed the poker to droop slowly down to 
his side, while he gazed at his visitor as if 
transfixed. She was of a typical brunette 
Southern type, her dark eyes, sensitive 


50 


Brown of Harvard 


mouth and chin denoting a character sub¬ 
ject to the sway of strong emotion. She 
was dressed inexpensively, but in excellent 
taste, and, taken all in all, she made a very 
desirable object to look upon. At least so 
thought Tom, who, after he had feasted 
his eyes and had recovered sufficiently 
from his surprise, was the first to speak. 

“Ah—ah—Miss Thorne, I believe? ” he 
drawled eventually. 

The girl spoke quickly, with the nerv¬ 
ous embarrassment of one who fears sur¬ 
veillance or discovery, and her words were 
marked by a very decided, though for that 
reason fascinating, Southern accent. 

“ Mr. Brown,” she replied, “ I—I was 
about to knock when—when—” she 
laughed unmirthfully. “ I know you will 
think it is strange for me to come here, 
alone, but—I was told—Is Mr. Ames 
here? ” 

“ No,” replied Tom reassuringly, with 
an intuition that his visitor was in some 
trouble and that he must sympathize with 
her and console her. “ He was here a 
while ago; but won’t you—er—come in? ” 


“ Touching’’ Tom Brown 51 

She hesitated, looking cautiously about, 
and stepped gingerly across the threshold. 

“ I suppose—I—should n’t.” 

“ Yes, oh, yes, of course you should n’t 
—no, I mean, come in—it’s all right. 
What’s the matter? ” 

The girl’s lips quivered with agitation, 
and she breathed in quick gasps as though 
she had been running. 

“ I know it’s not proper to come to a 
student’s room alone, but, Mr. Brown— 
there’s something—a favor, I want to ask 
of you. I know you ’re Wilton’s—Mr. 
Ames’s best friend. He has told me how 
good you’ve been to him.” 

“ Oh, come now, Miss Thorne,” replied 
Tom soothingly, and quickly closing the 
door, “ don’t say that—I’ve never done 
anything that another fellow would n’t 
have done under the same circumstances 
if he’d had the chance.” 

“ Oh, Mr. Brown,” she went on im¬ 
pulsively, “ I’m so worried about him. 
He—he is drinking all the time, and—and 
I have n’t seen him for days and days, and 
I must, I simply must see him,” 


52 


Brown of Harvard 


There were tears in her eyes now, and 
Tom felt his heart swell with a great pity 
for her. Ames! This beautiful creature 
was worrying about Ames! It seemed 
too bad. 

“I want you to ask him,” she said, 
speaking low, and with a faltering voice, 
“ to meet me to-night—he knows where. 
I can’t go to his house or send a note—his 
people look down upon me, and they 
would be angry if they knew-” 

“ If they knew! ” exclaimed Tom. 

“ Oh, Mr. Brown, I am so miserable,— 
I—I- 

Here she broke down utterly and fell 
to her knees on the floor in a tempest of 
emotion. 

“ Oh, don’t ask any questions,” she 
sobbed, “ only find him and send him to 
me! ” 

“ Oh, I say, Miss Thorne, you 
must n’t.” 

“ Oh, let me cry,” she went on, seizing 
him by the hand and clinging to it as if 
for protection from some threatened dan- 




“ Touching” Tom Brown 53 

ger—“ I am so miserable—so very, very 
wretched.” 

The birds were still merrily chirping in 
the budding tree outside the window. 
The slanting rays of the setting sun 
flooded the room with the glorious prom¬ 
ise of reawakening nature. The subtle, 
pervading freshness of spring was in the 
air, and the whole world seemed deli¬ 
cious, entrancing,—like a sweet haunting 
melody. But as Tom looked down at this 
poor creature at his side and attempted to 
raise her, to comfort her, he felt that for 
her, at least, the joy of spring was but 
a cruel, empty mockery. 


CHAPTER V 

MADDEN AND TOM ENTERTAIN 

HEN Madden reached the street 



" » he met Happy Thurston and 
Tubhy Anderson in the automobile, just 
drawing up in front of the door. 

“ Hello,” he cried, “ Where’s Jean? ” 

“We left him down in the yard,” re¬ 
plied Tubby, “ he had a date with a 
grind.” 

“What? One more unfortunate? 
Well, say, boys, I want you to help me 
find the ladies and then come back and 
take a little tea.” 

“We won’t be butting in? ” asked 
Thurston anxiously. 

“Not a bit;—and then you know, 
Happy, Evelyn will be there, and you 
and Tom can do another sprint. Why, 
it’s more exciting than a ’varsity race to 


54 


Madden and Tom Entertain 55 

see the way you two chumps are rushing 
that girl.” 

“ Chumps, eh? ” repeated Thurston in 
derision, as Madden got aboard the ma¬ 
chine, “how about Edith Sinclair?” 

“ Oh,” replied Madden solemnly, 
“ that’s an entirely different affair.” 

The other two laughed boisterously. 

“And, talking about Edith,” continued 
Madden, “ I imagine she’s down at Mrs, 
Ames’s. I believe Tom said so, did n’t 
he? Drive down there, Tubby.” 

The big touring car, with the corpulent 
Tubby Anderson as chauffeur, started 
ahead with a jerk and a loud, quick snap¬ 
ping of the exhaust, and then glided 
smoothly and swiftly down an avenue 
lined on either side with immense elms. 

In a few minutes they had stopped be¬ 
fore a typical Cambridge private resi¬ 
dence, sitting back comfortably in a pretty 
yard, shut off from the street by a dense 
hedge. Madden alighted and was about 
to go in for his guests when Tubby gave 
a squeeze of the horn bulb, and simultane¬ 
ously the front door opened and three 


56 


Brown of Harvard 


women made their appearance. One of 
them, who appeared to be the youngest, 
immediately ran lightly down the walk 
and held out her hand to Madden, who 
seized it as if it had been a gem beyond 
all price. 

“ Oh, Mr. Madden,” exclaimed the 
girl, “ it was so good of you to come for 
us in the automobile. We ’re all so very 
fatigued, you know, and I really don’t 
see how we could have walked those three 
long blocks without some kind of help.” 
The glorious sparkle in her eyes, the 
bright color in her cheeks, the health and 
heartiness that characterized her whole 
being, the nimble speed with which she 
had run down the walk, did not exactly 
bear out any suggestion of invalidism; 
but Madden was in that frame of mind, 
toward this particular creature, when he 
was inclined to take things literally, and 
he began to formulate a reply that would 
be exquisitely expressive of his sympathy. 

“ Er—er—why, I’m very glad, Miss 
Sinclair, if—er—er.” But when he had 
got that far the others had arrived on the 


Madden and Tom Entertain 57 


sidewalk. One of them, Mrs. Ames, was 
a sweet, motherly woman, to whom her 
son, despite his marks of dissipation, bore 
a strong resemblance. The other was a 
somewhat demure-looking girl, whose 
beautiful gray eyes, however, betrayed a 
keen sense of humor and a genuine enjoy¬ 
ment of life as lived by a pretty girl in a 
college town. 

“ How do you do, Mr. Madden,” 
greeted Mrs. Ames. “ Mr. Anderson 
and Mr. Thurston, too, I am glad to see 
you. Edith, you are getting to be a 
worse romp every day. The idea of your 
running ahead of us in that way,—it is 
perfectly scandalous. Well, Mr. Mad¬ 
den, here we are again for some of your 
delicious tea. These girls are making me 
frivolous in my old age. I’ve come to 
feel quite lost if I don’t get to your 
Thursday afternoons.” 

“ Oh,—ah, Mrs. Ames, we are always 
—er—er-” 

“ He means to say,” interrupted 
Tubby, after he and Thurston had shaken 
hands all around, and while the latter was 



58 


Brown of Harvard 


already deeply engaged in a conversation 
with Evelyn, “ he means to say, if you ’ll 
allow me to interpret, that he ’ll be over¬ 
joyed if you ’ll kindly step into the car 
so that we can take you around to his 
rooms.” 

“ What! ” exclaimed Mrs. Ames, some¬ 
what aghast—“ all of us get into the car 
at once—six of us? ” 

“ Oh, it’s nothing,” replied Tubby re¬ 
assuringly, giving her his hand and help¬ 
ing her to a seat in the rear, “ we ’ve had 
nine on board many a time, and could 
crowd even more in if it came to a pinch.” 

“And it will come to a pinch,” laughed 
Edith, as she took a seat next to Mrs. 
Ames. “ Come Evelyn, all aboard, the 
train is about to start.” 

Thurston having performed the agree¬ 
able duty of placing Evelyn next to her 
friend, the three young men crowded to¬ 
gether in front, and with a merry “ kronk, 
kronk,” the big machine was again under 
way. 

“ You must n’t notice Madden,” said 
Tubby, crooking his head over his 


Madden and Tom Entertain 59 


shoulder, “if he seems slightly confused. 
He’s working hard now under a ‘ grind/ 
and I think his mind’s affected.” 

“ Dry up, Tubby,” whispered Madden 
to his friend, “ don’t you try to be funny.” 

“ Oh, dear! I hope not, Mr. Madden. 
You really must n’t study too hard. You 
might become ill, don’t you know, and 
just think how badly your services are 
needed on the crew.” 

At this solicitous appeal Thurston and 
Tubby doubled up and grew red in the 
face with suppressed laughter. 

“We ’re doing the best we can with 
him, Mrs. Ames,” said Tubby, as soon as 
he was able to speak. “ Even to-day, we 
had occasion to help him not study quite 
as hard.” 

“ Now really,” began Madden, turn¬ 
ing around and facing the rear seat, 
“ really, I—er—er-” 

But by this time they had reached 
their destination. Almost before the car 
stopped Evelyn jumped out, and, run¬ 
ning lightly across the pavement, cried: 

“ I ’ll beat you this time, Edith.” 



6o 


Brown of Harvard 


Edith was about to take up the chal¬ 
lenge when she was peremptorily halted 
by Mrs. Ames. 

“Edith, stop! I won’t have any more 
of such tomboy conduct. Evelyn—come 
back! ” 

But Evelyn had disappeared in the 
doorway, and was already running breath¬ 
lessly up the stairs, leaving the others to 
follow at a more formal gait. 

When she reached the landing two 
floors above, she gave a little hurried 
knock on the door, and then opening it 
gently, stepped quietly inside. No sooner 
had she done so, however, than she drew 
back with a gasp of surprise. 

And well she might be surprised, for 
there, in the centre of the room, stood 
Tom, his arms clasped about Miss Thorne, 
whom he was apparently holding in a 
close, an affectionate embrace. 

“Oh!” The exclamation came from 
Evelyn involuntarily, and she leaned hack 
with one hand against the wall for sup¬ 
port. Marian hastily disengaged her¬ 
self, drew her veil over her face, and fairly 


Madden and Tom Entertain 61 


ran past Evelyn out of the room, leaving 
Tom staring after her blankly,—still more 
blankly when, for the first time, he caught 
sight of the girl whom he loved best in all 
the world, staring at him with an expres¬ 
sion of hopeless astonishment. 

For a few seconds there was a silence, 
broken only by the distant sound of those 
who were ascending the stairs. Then— 

“ Oh, I say,” drawled Tom in almost 
speechless dismay, thrusting his hands 
deep into his trousers pockets as the full 
significance of the situation dawned upon 
him. 

“ Tom Brown!” exclaimed Evelyn, in 
a horrified whisper. 

“ But, Evelyn,” cried Tom, making an 
impulsive step toward her, “ I can 
explain.” 

“ You owe me no explanation, I’m 
sure,” replied Evelyn freezingly. 

44 Oh, but, Evelyn, give a fellow a 
chance. Listen, I was only-” 

“Shh!” whispered Evelyn warningly. 
“ The others are here! ” 

Once more the door opened, and Mad- 



62 


Brown of Harvard 


den entered with Mrs. Ames, followed by 
the rest of the party. 

“ Well, Evelyn,” said Edith, “ it 
was n’t a bit fair. I know I could have 
beaten you, only your mother would n’t 
let me run.” 

“ Evelyn, my dear,” said Mrs. Ames in 
a matter-of-fact tone of reproof, “ I’m 
quite shocked at you, quite shocked. It 
is perfectly scandalous for you to behave 
so. The idea! Running up-stairs un¬ 
chaperoned to a student’s room. Well, 
Tom, dear boy,” she went on, somewhat 
irrelevantly, and giving him her hand, 
“ I’m very glad to see you. You can 
fancy how much we enjoy your charming 
teas from the way Evelyn ran up the 
stairs so as to be first.” 

“Ah, yes,” replied Tom absently, with 
his mind still on Evelyn, who by this time 
was again monopolized by the industrious 
Thurston. “ What ’ll you have to drink? 
Er—er, I beg pardon, I mean, I’m so— 
I’m so glad you could come. Clax, get 
out the tea-things like a good fellow, will 
you? ” 


Madden and Tom Entertain 63 

Madden obediently set to work to get 
the cups and saucers, abstracting them 
from various unsuspected places, includ¬ 
ing the bookshelf, the drawers of the desk 
and table, from underneath the window 
seat, and from the mysterious recesses 
of the two bedrooms. While he was en¬ 
gaged in this interesting occupation, 
Tubby lent a hand at setting the table, 
thereby giving ample evidence that he 
was not obliged to earn money during the 
summer months by acting as a waiter. 

“ You ’ll serve for us, won’t you, Mrs. 
Ames? ” asked Tom as he took her wrap. 
He also tried to take Evelyn’s, but that 
young lady turned from him deliberately, 
and handed it to Thurston, with whom she 
was apparently absorbed in a most des¬ 
perate flirtation. Tom gazed at them in 
an agony of despairing fascination, a 
fascination so engrossing that, oblivious 
to everything else, he presently found 
himself politely holding Mrs. Ames’s 
wrap for her to put it on again. 

“ Why, Tom,” said Mrs. Ames, whose 
motherly instinct soon apprised her of 


64 Brown of Harvard 

the situation, “ you don’t want me to go 
right away again, do you? ” 

“ Oh,” said Tom, deeply mortified, “ I 
beg your pardon. Of course not, of 
course not—I was—I was merely think¬ 
ing of-” 

But here poor Tom got to the end of 
his rope, and in his confusion doubled 
Mrs. Ames’s wrap into a compact ball and 
stowed it carefully under her chair, at 
the same time keeping an eagle eye on 
the conduct of Evelyn and Thurston. 

“ Oh, Mr. Thurston,” said Evelyn, with 
the very obvious intention of being over¬ 
heard by Tom, “ Edith and I watched 
your crew practice on the river to-day 
from her back window on Beacon Street, 
and really, you know, I think rowing men 
are ever so much more attractive than any 
other class of athletes. They look so 
lovely in their—their uniforms.” 

“ Why, Evie,” cried Edith in surprise, 
“ last year you simply would n’t look at 
a man who did n’t go in for football.” 

“ Oh, well, you see,” broke in Tom, re¬ 
gaining his assurance and once more 



Madden and Tom Entertain 65 


speaking with his accustomed drawl, 
“ that was last year, and I had n’t gone 
in for rowing then.” 

“ You flatter yourself, Mr. Brown,” re¬ 
torted Evelyn coldly. 

“ Why should n’t I ? I don’t notice 
anybody else throwing bouquets my way.” 

“ Well,” said Mrs. Ames, “ it’s the 
duty of all of us to be enthusiastic over 
the rowing men, now that the English 
crew is coming. We shouldn’t be pa¬ 
triotic otherwise.” 

“ Of course we ’ll beat them, won’t we 
Mr. Madden? ” inquired Evelyn. 

“ Oh, I don’t know. They have n’t 
been beaten yet, but Harvard never had 
so good a crew as this year.” 

“ Mrs. Ames,” said Thurston, who 
evidently preferred confining the conver¬ 
sation as much as possible to a personal 
channel, “ I just managed to get through 
calculus.” 

“ Is that so? ” inquired Tom, promptly 
“ butting in,” “ who sat next to you? ” 

Both Evelyn and Thurston turned 
around and endeavored to squelch Tom 


66 


Brown of Harvard 


with a look of withering scorn. The lat¬ 
ter, however, appeared to bear the ordeal 
manfully. 

“ But,” resumed Thurston to his com¬ 
panion in a confiding tone, “ I’m going 
to work hard next year-” 

“ Why, old man,” inquired Tom anx¬ 
iously, “ are n’t you coming back to 
college? ” 

“ The faculty,” went on Thurston, pay¬ 
ing no attention to these irrelevant inter¬ 
ruptions, “ the faculty seem pleased with 
the work I did last half and-” 

“ Yes,” remarked Tom, “ they ’re so 
pleased that they are going to give him 
an encore on his Junior year.” 

“ Say, Kid,” snapped out Thurston in 
some heat, 44 you ’re full of dry humor, 
are n’t you? ” 

44 Yes, but the trouble is it’s so very 
dry. I always have to pay for the drinks 
to get any one to listen to it. I say, Mrs. 
Ames, the kettle’s boiling—will you sit 
here? ” 

Mrs. Ames took her place at the head 
of the table, and began to make the tea. 




Madden and Tom Entertain 67 

“ Do you think, Mr. Madden,” she in¬ 
quired, “ that my son will get a place on 
the crew? ” 

The men stared at her in amazement, 
even Tom losing for the moment his 
jovial, bantering expression. 

“ What! ” replied Madden, “ Wilton— 
Wilton—er—er—make the crew? ” 

“ Oh, you need n’t all look so sur¬ 
prised,” said Evelyn, coming to her 
mother’s defence. “ Wilton rows just 
beautifully. Why, he used to go awfully 
fast when he took me out on the river sum¬ 
mer nights, and it was a much heavier 
boat than those shells you use. I think 
it’s a perfect shame if they don’t let Wil¬ 
ton row.” 

“ Well—er—Miss Ames, I don’t be¬ 
lieve Wilton will stand for the train¬ 
ing.” 

“ Yes,” said Mrs. Ames, as she poured 
out the tea and handed the cups to the 
ever obliging Tubby, “ I’m afraid the 
poor boy is studying too hard.” 

At this one of the cups Tubby was 
carrying toppled over and the steaming 


68 


Brown of Harvard 


hot brew landed on his leg, just above the 
knee. 

“ Oh, ouch! ” he exclaimed as the cup 
in the other hand fell to the floor with a 
crash. “Gee whiz, that’s hot!” 

“ Look here, Tubby,” said Tom, “ do 
you think we run a crockery store? Clax, 
that makes the seventh cup in two weeks 
—and now there are n’t enough to go 
around. I guess you and I will have to 
use shaving mugs.” 

“ There’s something curiously changed 
about Wilton,” resumed Mrs. Ames while 
Madden disappeared for the mugs. 
“ Don’t you think so, Evie? ” 

“ Yes,” replied the daughter, “ he 
seems so tired all the time, poor fellow. 
You see he goes over to Boston every 
night to study with a friend over there 
at the Parker House. They take late 
lunches at night, and in the morning he 
simply can’t eat a bit of breakfast, he has 
worked so hard.” 

Poor Tubby, who had taken a mouth¬ 
ful of tea, began to choke and splutter in 
a most disgraceful fashion, to such an ex- 


Madden and Tom Entertain 69 


tent, indeed, that Tom was obliged to give 
him a kick of admonition. 

“ I ’m quite worried about him,” con¬ 
tinued Mrs. Ames. “And, Tom, I’m 
going to scold you and the other boys a 
little. When Wilton came home the other 
night I happened to be up, and—he— 
was a little affected by that strong punch 
you gave him, telling the poor innocent 
fellow it was claret lemonade. I don’t 
object to a joke, but really, Tom, I was 
surprised that you should have thought it 
funny to get Wilton that way.” 

Tom looked at her, his face red 
with embarrassment, not unmixed with 
indignation. 

“ Did he tell you that—er—about 
that? 

“ Yes, because I insisted upon know¬ 
ing where he had been; but he shielded you 
all he could. There’s nothing mean 
about Wilton.” 

Here the unfortunate Tubby exploded 
again, letting fly a mouthful of tea in all 
directions, in a most indecorous, reprehen¬ 
sible manner. Tom and Thurston and 


7o 


Brown of Harvard 


Madden came heroically to his rescue, 
pounding him on the back, grinning ex¬ 
pansively the while. 

“ I’m beginning to think we don’t 
know Mr. Brown as well as we thought 
we did,” remarked Evelyn, after the row 
had subsided and Tubby was able to sit 
up and take notice. 

“ Well,” responded Tom, “ I’m sure 
I’ve tried in every way to have you ‘ get 
next ’ to me.” 

During the laugh that followed this 
brilliant sally, there was a knock at the 
door. 

“ Come in,” shouted Madden. 

The door opened slowly, disclosing a 
short fat man, of very obvious German 
extraction, wearing a somewhat seedy 
uniform and carrying a clarinet under his 
arm. 

“ Hello, Schneider,” cried Tom. 
“ Come in. Ladies, allow me to present 
Herr Fritz Schneider, of Schneider’s 
Brass Band of three, private musicians to 
the Goolash Club.” 

“ Oh,” cried Evelyn clapping her hands 


Madden and Tom Entertain 7 1 


and pulling the somewhat astonished mu¬ 
sician into the room, 44 we’ve heard of 
you, Mr. Schneider. I’m so glad to meet 
you. Now you can tell us just what the 
men do at the Goolash Club, won’t you? ” 

44 Schneider,” interrupted Tom, 44 1 
suppose you Ve come to collect your bill. 
Remember—silence is golden.” 

Herr Schneider, still apparently some¬ 
what dazed, looked about him in mute 
inquiry. 

44 Ach Gott, yes, Mister Kit,” he said 
at length, 44 1 should n’t say noddings— 
aber, die junge Fraulein—die schoene, 
junge Fraulein—how can I refuse a laty, 
yet, what? ” 

44 Oh,” laughed Tom, 44 you giddy young 
thing; I should n’t have thought it of you. 
By the way, Schneider, while we ’re all 
here, what do you say to a dance? Spiel 
us a waltz, old man.” 

44 Wass iss? ” inquired Schneider, 44 you 
wish I should a valse make right here 
yet?” 

44 Yah, das iss,” replied Tom. 

Herr Schneider, to whom the vagaries 


72 


Brown of Harvard 


of college students were evidently some¬ 
what familiar accepted the situation phil¬ 
osophically, and, after seating himself 
gingerly on the edge of a chair, started 
up an old-fashioned Dutch waltz. 

“Oh, what fun!” exclaimed Edith as 
she was whisked away by Madden. Tom 
made for Evelyn but that young lady, 
casting upon him a glance of inexpressible 
hauteur, consigned herself to the tender 
mercies of the delighted and triumphant 
Thurston. Tubby Anderson, having no 
one for a partner, made the best of a bad 
job by removing the table-cloth, tying it 
around his waist as a skirt, and giving a 
fairly clever imitation of the Dutch style 
of waltzing, at the same time aiding and 
abetting Herr Schneider’s clarinet by 
singing the tune in an extremely nasal 
bass. Tom, who was bound to be cheer¬ 
ful despite the spurning he had received at 
the hands of his beloved, mounted the win¬ 
dow seat and proceeded to beat time with 
all the energy and enthusiasm of a con¬ 
ductor who has a symphony orchestra at 
his command. 


Madden and Tom Entertain 73 

It was while performing thus, to the 
great delight of Mrs. Ames, who was 
fairly convulsed with laughter, that Tom 
chanced to glance out of the window. In 
an instant his whole demeanor changed. 

“ Stop! ” he cried. 

There was something so odd, so un¬ 
usual, so excited in his manner, that all 
were quiet in a moment, even Tubby 
sobering sufficiently to ask: 

“ What’s the row, Kid? ” 

Tom jumped down from the window- 
seat and stared wildly at the door, as if he 
had suddenly lost his senses. Quickly 
pulling himself together, however, he 
stepped up to Thurston and Tubby, and 
seizing them by the shoulder pushed them 
toward Madden’s room. 

“ Oh, I say,” he exclaimed, losing for 
once his habitual drawl, “ I ’ve just 
thought of a game—a new game I learned 
last week. It ’ll beat dancing all hollow. 
Get into Madden’s room quick,” he urged, 
as he pushed the girls also toward the 
door, “ all of you. It’s the funniest 
thing you ever heard of. But you must 


74 


Brown of Harvard 


be quick,—quick! Yes—you too, Mrs. 
Ames, it ’ll be spoiled if any one of you 
stays out.” And so, laughing and talk¬ 
ing and pushing and persuading, in an 
incredibly short time he had herded them 
all inside and locked the door, whereupon 
he rushed to the window and leaned far 
out. 

“ Oh, the fool! the fool! ” he exclaimed, 
drawing his head back into the room. 
“ He’s coming up here! Here, Schnei¬ 
der,” he cried to the musician who, during 
the recent manoeuvres had been staring 
stupidly at Tom, his clarinet still held to 
his lips, “here’s the money I owe you; 
now out—get out—quick.” 

“ Wass iss—you vant no more 

spiel-” 

But Tom, in order to remove all doubts 
as to his meaning, seized Herr Schneider 
by the back of the neck and fairly lifted 
him out of the room. 

At this point a tremendous clatter and 
pounding was set up on Madden’s door. 

“ Here, Kid,” exclaimed Madden, 
“ what the devil did you lock us up for? ” 



Madden and Tom Entertain 75 

Tom ran excitedly over to Madden’s 
door. 

“Be quiet, Clax, will you? You ’ll 
spoil the whole thing. You can’t come in 
until I’m ready.” 

Scarcely had he finished speaking when 
the hall door opened, and Ames entered, 
his face flushed, his hair dishevelled, his 
eyes staring wildly,—hopelessly, terribly 
drunk. 


CHAPTER VI 

TOM BROWN'S LITTLE JOKE 


MES staggered over to a couch and 



** fell on it in a state of utter collapse, 
slowly weaving his body to and fro and 
looking stupidly at the floor, while Tom 
gazed at him in an agony of anxiety. 

“Ames—Wilton—for God’s sake, man,” 
he whispered, his voice hoarse with the 
tensity of his agitation, “ your mother and 
sister are here. Go to the club, I ’ll fol¬ 
low you. Come,” he pleaded, placing his 
hand on Ames’s elbow and vainly at¬ 
tempting to help him to his feet. 

“ She’s followin’ me,” mumbled Ames, 
in his old whining tone, and beginning to 
shed maudlin tears. 44 Marian Thorne— 
poor girl—she’s followin’ me. Must n’ 
see me like this. You mus’ help me— 
gotto help me, Brown.” 


Tom Brown’s Little Joke 77 

He lurched forward and would have 
fallen to the floor had not Tom caught 
him by the shoulder and thrust him back 
on the couch. 

“ Listen, do you hear? ” again whis¬ 
pered Tom. “ Your mother and sister 
are locked up in that room—in Madden’s 
room. They must n’t see you here. 
Can’t you understand? ” 

Ames made a feeble effort to rise, and 
then sank back in a drunken daze on the 
couch. 

“ Wha’ ’s the joke? Mother and sister 
locked up ? Wha’ ’s you givin’ me ? ” And 
then, burying his face in his hands, he 
moaned: “ I’m desp’rate, Kid,—desp’rate. 
I’m goin’ kill myself. There’s that girl, 

Kid—sweetes’ girl-” But he could 

go no further. Overwhelmed by the liq¬ 
uor he had drunk, deprived of the power 
to speak, or to think, or to move, he fell 
over on the couch in a state of utter, of 
hopeless collapse. 

“Ames, oh, for God’s sake, Ames,” 
begged Tom piteously, “ listen, will you— 
you must get out of here.” In the frenzy 



78 Brown ol Harvard 

of his desperation he shook the other by 
the shoulder violently, but his body 
merely moved helplessly to and fro—a 
human derelict foundered with drink. 

“ I say there, Kid,” shouted Madden 
from the confines of his room, “ how 
much longer is this joke going to last? ” 

And then there was resumed the heavy 
pounding on the door. 

Tom looked about him wildly, at his 
wit’s end; and then, seized by a sudden 
inspiration, he pulled the insensible Ames 
off to the floor, and with a mighty effort 
pushed him under the couch and pulled 
the drapery down in front. It was a 
desperate expedient, perhaps, but for the 
moment it was successful, as not a sign of 
his unwelcome visitor was visible. He 
had risen to his feet and was about to step 
over to Madden’s room when the hall door 
opened suddenly and once more Marian 
Thorne stood there on the threshold, pale, 
trembling, as agitated as himself. 

“ Where is he? ” she cried, “ I saw him 
come in here—Wilton Ames.” 

“ Go away!” exclaimed Tom, almost 


Tom Brown’s Little Joke 79 

brusque in his excitement—“ I ’ll send 
him to you. Go away, I tell you, you 
must leave at once! ” 

But the girl stepped doggedly into the 
room. 

“ I won’t go away until I see him. 
Why, oh, why do you keep him from 
me? He is in one of these rooms.” She 
stepped swiftly across towards Madden’s 
door, but when the pounding on it was re¬ 
sumed with renewed vigor, she shrank 
back in terror. 

“ Shh! ” cried Tom, seizing her by the 
arm and leading her to his own room. 
“ Go in there. Wait until they are gone 
and you shall see him. Trust me. For 
God’s sake, woman, go, go! ” 

He thrust her inside, closed the door on 
her, and rushed over to his chum’s room. 
The pounding had now taken on a face¬ 
tious character, in imitation of the rhyth¬ 
mical beat of a drum. Unlocking the 
door, Tom darted over to the couch and 
threw himself down upon it, making a 
supreme effort to summon up an appear¬ 
ance of unconcern. 


8o 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Come in!” he shouted. 

The door burst open with a bang and 
the newly released prisoners rushed out 
into the larger room, looking about 
expectantly. 

“ What is it, Kid? ” cried Tubby in a 
fever of anticipation, “ where’s the joke 
—what’s the game? ” 

Tom looked up at them with an assump¬ 
tion of his old cheerfulness: 

“ Why, don’t you people know,” he 
drawled, “ that this is the first of April? ” 
With a simultaneous movement, the 
entire party collapsed into the most avail¬ 
able seats. As for Tubby, he fell from 
his seat to the floor and rolled over and 
over, very much like a human barrel. 

“ Sold! ” he cried in a tone of exquisite 
anguish, “ sold again! ” 

For a moment they sat staring at 
Tom blankly. Then Madden, suddenly 
springing from his chair, seized his 
chum’s arms from behind and dragged him 
from the couch. 

“What’ll we do with him, boys?” he 
shouted, “how’ll we get even?” 



Why, don’t you people know,” he drawled, “that this is the first of April? 


































Tom Brown’s Little Joke 81 

“ I tell you/’ replied Evelyn gayly, 
“ let’s lock him up in his own room until 
after vespers, and see how he likes the 
first of April! ” 

“No, no!” cried Tom struggling des¬ 
perately to free himself from Madden’s 
powerful grasp. “ No, please, please 
don’t.” 

His protestations, however, had the 
effect of adding fuel to the fire. 

“ Just the thing,” cried Tubby glee¬ 
fully, as he and Thurston also seized Tom 
by a convenient member and began push¬ 
ing and pulling him towards his room. 

“ No, fellows—” exclaimed Tom furi¬ 
ously, “ I say, darn it all, not there.” 

Evelyn, brimming over with laughter, 
ran ahead of the struggling mass, and 
threw the door to Tom’s room open wide. 
Then she stopped still, rigid with amaze¬ 
ment, as she beheld Marian Thorne stand¬ 
ing in the doorway. 

For an instant there was an intense 
silence, the men releasing their grip of 
Tom and staring at the apparition, in a 
paralysis of astonishment, until at length 


82 


Brown of Harvard 


Marian, confused, frightened, dismayed, 
closed the door in their faces. 

Tubby was the first to break the pain¬ 
ful silence, but his effort proved a feeble 
one. 

“ What the deuce! ” he ejaculated, and 
then stopped short in helpless amazement. 

Mrs. Ames walked over to Evelyn, who 
seemed about to faint, and placed her arm 
about her waist. 

“ Come, Evelyn,—Edith,—I am afraid 
we have staid a trifle too long. Mr. An¬ 
derson, Mr. Thurston, will you join us? 
I fear we need an escort here.” 

As the party moved out of the room, 
Tom cried out bitterly: 

“ Evelyn—oh, Evelyn—it was all,— 
only —” 

But Evelyn, not deigning to notice him, 
had disappeared with the others through 
the doorway. Madden also had taken up 
his hat to accompany his guests to the 
street, hut he turned around abruptly and 
stepping up to Tom placed his arm af¬ 
fectionately on his shoulder. 

“ Kid,” he said kindly, “ I know it’s all 



Tom Brown’s Little Joke 83 


some damn beastly mistake—you know 
I know it, old man. I ’ll get out of the 
way so that you can clear things up. But 
—if I can do anything for you, Kid,” he 
added, and his voice was strangely choked 
as he spoke, “ you ’ll let me know it, old 
man, won’t you? ” 

“ Yes, Clax,” replied Tom vacantly, 
“ of course I know you believe in me. 
But—but you better go, old man, and— 
and see the ladies home.” 

Madden seized his chum’s hand in a 
firm grip, and then hurried out after the 
others. 

Left alone, Tom sank limply back into 
the arm-chair and stared, like one in a 
daze, over toward the couch, under which 
lay the unconscious instrument of all his 
misery. 

“ Oh, wake up, Tom Brown,” he mut¬ 
tered wofully to himself, “ wake up, old 
man, or turn over. You ’re sleeping on 
your back! ” 


CHAPTER VII 


DROWNING MISERY 

C OR exactly two weeks after the in- 
* cident of the vanishing lady in the 
bedroom Tom went about in a state of 
such abject dolor that it seemed almost 
as if he were on the verge of collapse. 
The suddenness, the wholly unexpected 
complication of the situation in which he 
had found himself, the fact of his own in¬ 
nocence and of Evelyn’s apparent lack of 
confidence in him, and above all the un¬ 
failing conviction that he must not under 
any circumstances betray either Marian or 
Ames,—all these things weighed down on 
him with the crushing force of an over¬ 
whelming burden. At the end of that pe¬ 
riod, however, the natural exuberance of 
spirits, aided and abetted by the inspirit¬ 
ing influence of the season, by his youth, 


Drowning Misery 85 

and by the panacea of time itself, caused 
him to suspect that perhaps, after all, the 
world was not quite so black as it seemed, 
and that a day might eventually arrive 
when he would once more be restored to 
the good graces of his sweetheart. He 
had not seen her for five consecutive days. 
She had returned the engagement ring 
which he had given her early in the first 
half-year, and yet he had advanced so far 
in his convalescence at the end of the two 
weeks as to be able to sit on the steps of 
the old dormitory, Holworthy, in the de¬ 
licious air of the April afternoon, and, in 
company with Madden and Tubby and 
Thurston and others of his “ crowd,” en¬ 
deavor to drown the tumult of his agony 
in songs—songs of pathos, songs of love, 
songs of the troubadour, songs of the min¬ 
strel end-man, rag-time songs, hymns, 
two-steps, medleys, glees, madrigals,— 
in fact, the whole gamut to which the col¬ 
lege man is exposed under the seductive 
influence of soft caressing spring, and of 
a soul that can soar high above the petty 
trials of earth. 


86 


Brown of Harvard 


“I say, fellows,” ' said Tubby during 
an interlude in this impromptu perform¬ 
ance, the while he sat at the base of a tree 
with his chubby shoulders to its trunk, 
the back of his head reposing tenderly in 
the palms of his clasped hands, and a 
“ dead ” pipe sagging unbeautifully from 
the corner of his mouth, causing him to 
indulge in an occasional unwonted lisp, 
“ there’s a chap lives over in Stoughton 
who’s invented a scheme for studying 
so’s you won’t have to—to study at all.” 

Instead of gibbering hilariously at the 
very palpable paradox of Tubby’s state¬ 
ment, his auditors looked at him with 
surprised interest. For some occult rea¬ 
son, Anderson’s announcement seemed to 
strike them, one and all, in a tender 
spot. 

“ No, honest, Tubby,” inquired Mad¬ 
den anxiously—“ you ’re not joshing, old 
man, are you? ” 

“Not a bit of it,” replied Tubby ear¬ 
nestly, removing the pipe for the greater 
effectiveness of his speech—“ I’ve seen 
it, but I’ve never tried it on. Why, it’s 


87 


Drowning Misery 

simple—very simple. The thing is a sort 
of phonograph, fixed up so as to run by a 
motor as long as you want it. Whatever 
you want to study is put down on differ¬ 
ent records—astronomy, chem., history, 
math., lit., geology 4, anything you like.” 

“How do you work it?” asked Mad¬ 
den, who seemed to be especially inter¬ 
ested when the subject of astronomy was 
mentioned. 

“Why, it’s a cinch,” replied Tubby; 
“ all you got to do is to slap on your rec¬ 
ord, turn out the light, lie down in bed 
or on the floor, pull a string, and the thing 
sails away smooth as grease. It ’ll repeat 
itself for ten hours, so that you ’re bound 
to go asleep before it gets through.” 

“ Well, what’s the good of that? ” 
asked Madden with some disappointment, 
“ if you ’re sure to fall asleep, what’s the 
use? Quit your kidding, Tubby.” 

“No kidding at all; why, pshaw! man,” 
said Tubby, looking at Madden with 
contempt writ large on his round face, 
“ did n’t you ever hear of unconscious 
cerebration? ” 


88 


Brown of Harvard 


Madden appeared somewhat dazed, and 
said nothing. 

“ I tell you,” insisted Tubby warmly, 
“ it’s great. It works while you sleep. 
Yes, sir, for a fact. The constant grind¬ 
ing away of that thing will fix the lesson 
on anybody’s mind—even on yours, Clax, 
and in the morning when you wake up 
you ’ll have the whole business at the end 
of your tongue and—why—when it comes 
to exams you can go in and knock the 
prof’s eye out.” 

Madden cocked his head toward his 
friend dubiously, half tempted to ask for 
an introduction to the inventor of this 
ingenious device, but an irrepressible 
twinkle in Tubby’s eye gave him pause, 
and fearing, from a long and profitable 
experience, that he was about to be “ sold ” 
in order to gratify Tubby’s sense of 
humor, he prudently kept mum. 

“ By the way, fellows,” interposed 
Thurston, “ I heard a good one on Pro¬ 
fessor Cook to-day—you know—Slimy 
Cook, up at the chem. lab. You know 
how awful fond he is of joshing the men, 



I tell you,” insisted Tubby warmly, “it’s great! ” 






































■» 















* 






















































■t; 

















* 



* 


















i 





















I 































- • 


» 
































































































































































4 



8 9 


Drowning Misery 

punning, and all that sort of thing— 
thinks he’s the funniest thing that hap¬ 
pened since Mark Twain. Well, there’s 
a new ‘ grind ’ in our section—a big tall 
fellow, about a mile high, mostly bones. 
His name’s Slack. Never saw such a 
bunch of bones in your life; looks like an 
animated relic of the mastodon period.” 

“Ah, cut it short, Happy,” cried Tubby 
with a considerable show of impatience. 
“ Where does the joke come in? ” 

“ Well, this chap—this bony one, you 
know—comes from the backwoods some¬ 
where, so when Slimy had him up on his 
feet in classroom, Slimy asks him, in that 
funny way he has of lisping through his 
nose: 4 Mr. Sthlack,—how do you Sthlack 
lime? * ” 

“ Old Slimy thought he had worked off 
a beaut and turned to the men for sympa¬ 
thy and appreciation, but quick as a wink, 
his bony giblets from the backwoods 
comes back at him. 

“ How do you Slack lime, sir? ” he re¬ 
peats very slowly and impressively, “ why, 
-—Cook it, sir.” 


9 o 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Well, you ought to ’a’ heard that 
bunch roar! Old Slimy has n’t got over 
it yet. They say it feazed him so he 
could n’t get on with his lecture,—and no 
wonder. The subject was ‘ calcium 
oxide.’ ” 

“ Good for his Bonelets,” said Jean de 
Reszke gleefully. “ It’s time somebody 
called Slimy’s bluffs. He had his guard 
down then for fair. But say, fellows, did 
you ever hear of Dr. Beckwith—you 
know, ‘Becky’—getting done up?” 

The men sat quiet, bending their ener¬ 
gies to the effort of solemn recollection. 

“ Why, I sa-ay,” drawled Tom, after a 
moment of silence, “ I never heard of 
Becky getting done up, but I’ve heard of 
lots of fellows who tried it.” 

“ That’s just it,” continued Jean en¬ 
thusiastically, “ they try it, and get left 
every time. I remember one day, Sopho¬ 
more year, when a lot of us got to class 
ahead of time, and smeared the cushion of 
his chair all over with mucilage. Then 
we all sat down, still as death, and waited 
for Beck to come in and attach himself to 


Drowning Misery 91 

the glue. Pretty soon he trots along 
with his bald head and glasses, and that 
kind of innocent way he has, as if he never 
suspected anybody of being anything but 
an angel. We thought we had him sure 
and almost died trying to hold in and keep 
from laughing. You know how Beck 
talks—with that broad A of his that 
would make a Britisher look like a two- 
spot; well, sir, he stepped right up on the 
platform, walked over to the chair, tipped 
the cushion upside down, and says to the 
bunch, like a man asking the way to the 
courthouse: ‘ Did the clahss think I was 
such a blahsted ahss as to sit down in 
the mucilage?’ And I’ve never found 
out to this day how he discovered the joke. 

44 The fellows felt pretty sore about it, 
anyhow. They had expected to bust 
their gizzards laughing when Becky 
landed on the cushion, but the only satis¬ 
faction they got was to see the mucilage 
dripping down through the holes in the 
seat of the chair, while Beck just handed 
out Greek moods and tenses and roots 
until you could n’t rest. It was a mean 


92 Brown of Harvard 

sort of revenge, and we decided to get 
even. 

“ So the next day we appointed a com¬ 
mittee of ways and means, and delegated 
them to go around to the classroom and 
fix that door so it could n’t be opened for 
a considerable space of period. The com¬ 
mittee was faithful to its trust. I was 
chairman, and I took along a hammer 
and chisel, and about a bale of cotton. 
We packed the cotton in good and tight 
in the keyhole with the chisel, and then 
squirted water on it so it would freeze 
over night. Cold? You bet it was cold. 
It was the middle of February, and there 
must have been skating down as far as the 
equator. 

“ Well, we lined up once more and 
waited for Beck to come along and try to 
unlock that bunch of cement, of course 
figuring that he could n’t do it, and we 
could get a little well-deserved recreation 
from those damned Greek irregulars. 

“ In about five minutes he comes along, 
same as ever, pretending not to notice the 
bunch of us who had lined up on the stair- 


93 


Drowning Misery 

case leading to the next floor, waiting for 
our cinch to hatch out. Well, sir, for a 
time, we thought we had him groggy. He 
tried the handle of the door and found it 
locked, and then pulled out a bunch of 
keys, and tried to poke one into that mess 
of frozen cotton. He might as well have 
tried to punch a hole in the side of a bat¬ 
tleship with a thimble. Nothing doing. 
By that time we were just hugging our¬ 
selves, partly from joy, and partly to 
keep warm, for it was getting most con¬ 
foundedly cold. But just as we were en¬ 
joying ourselves to the limit, Beck sizes 
us up through his glasses and says: 

“ ‘ I regret to tell the clahss that I Ve 
brought the wrong key. Consequently, 
I shall be obliged to hold the recitation 
here in the hallway.’ 

“ With that he backs up to the steam 
radiator at the foot of the stairs, where it 
was good and warm, and, sir, he held us 
there for the full hour sitting on the steps, 
shivering to beat the band, while we 
flunked from alpha to omega, because 
of course not a son-of-a-gun of us had 


94 


Brown of Harvard 


even looked at the lesson. You never 
saw such a lot of frozen Greek roots in 
your life! It was a low-down trick, I 
say,” added Jean somewhat ruefully, as 
his companions grinned at the conclusion 
of his recital; “ why, suppose we had got 
pneu-” 

At this moment, however, there was an 
interruption. An elderly man of a pro¬ 
nounced Russian-Jewish type, with a 
long unkempt beard and a faded, dinkey 
brown derby hat settled down well over 
his ears, stepped up to the crowd of stu¬ 
dents, with his hands outspread, palms 
upward, in characteristic fashion. 

“ Oh, look here, Bones,” said Madden 
in a tone of disgust, “ you just move on. 
You ’re trying to butt in on Max Keezer’s 
monopoly.” 

“ But, chentlemen,” replied the intruder 
pleadingly, “ ain’t you got nodding you 
vant to sell? ” 

“ Now, look here, Bones, old sport,” re¬ 
turned Madden, if I sell you any more 
old clothes I ’ll have to go around in my 
pajamas. You’ve got all my best things 



Drowning Misery 95 

now. Next thing you know, you ’ll be 
after my beautiful sweater.” 

“ Yes,” persisted Mr. Bones with the 
manner of one whose argument is irresis¬ 
tible, “ but I sell ’em again to you cheap, 
almost as cheap as you sold to me,—just 
a little profit for a poor man,—and be¬ 
sides, dey just fit you fine.” 

“ Well,” exclaimed Madden, somewhat 
aghast, “ of all the nerve, that’s the limit. 
Sell me my own clothes again! Get out 
of here, will you ? I tell you I have n’t 
got anything but what I’m standing 
up in.” 

“Now, ain’t dot a pity? ” replied the old- 
clothes man, his voice and manner indica¬ 
tive of the deepest dejection, “ and you 
vas von of my best customers. I could 
fit you fine in dem tings I bought last 
spring ven you vas hard up—and you 
look just grand.” Then, addressing the 
others, “ Anything in my line to-day, 
chents? ” 

“No,” replied Tubby despondently. 
“ Max Keezer’s got all mine.” 

“ Nothing doing here, Bonesy, old 


9<3 


Brown of Harvard 


sport,” said Jean cheerfully; “ but Coyne, 
over at Matthews, says he wants to see 
you.” 

“Ach, goot, I go mit him right away 
vonce.” 

Here, Tom, who had thus far taken no 
part in the colloquy, jumped from his 
perch on the steps, and seizing the itiner¬ 
ant merchant by the shoulders, began to 
march him solemnly around the big elm, 
at the same time chanting, to a familiar 
Gregorian tune, the refrain, 

“Any rags, any bones, any bottles 
to-day? ” 

The others were not slow to follow his 
example, and seizing each other by the 
shoulders they marched, in true lock-step 
fashion, around and around the elm. 
Faster and faster moved the procession, 
until at length Tom, who, in this absorb¬ 
ing occupation of master of ceremonies, 
seemed suddenly to have shed all his 
mortal cares, gripped the old man firmly 
by the hips, and the whole line of rollick¬ 
ing, singing, shouting students rushed 
their unfortunate victim at a break-neck 


97 


Drowning Misery 

clip down the broad walk. As they 
panned the corner they ran pell mell into 
two young men who, unfortunately for 
themselves, were approaching in the op¬ 
posite direction. Cine of these, Madden’s 
tutor in astronomy, was sent spinning 
over against a bench, while Cartright, his 
companion, offering less resistance, was 
literally swept from his feet, and landed 
on the steps of the dormitory, his hat de¬ 
scribing a neat trajectory through the air, 
leaving his scant hair to he fanned by the 
sweet spring zephyrs, while he gazed at 
the retreating cyclone with a look of the 
most utter, abandoned astonishment. 


CHAPTER VIII 


THE TRIALS OF A HEAD COACH 

“T SAY, Thorne/’ observed Cartright 
* solemnly, after he had recovered his 
cap, and to some extent his equilibrium, 
“did—did you meet anybody?” 

Thorne smiled feebly,—in a perfunc¬ 
tory way. The hardships, the bitterness, 
of his early life had served to suppress, if 
not wholly to eliminate, any quality of 
humor that might have been native to his 
character, and, young man though he 
was, he felt small sympathy for the rol¬ 
licking, joyous spirit that pervaded the 
life of the University. 

“ I think it was Brown and Madden 
and their gang,” he said grimly, with a 
scowl. 

“Well, cheer up, anyhow,” cried Cart- 
right, taking a seat by his side on the bench 


The Trials of a Head Coach 99 

and slapping him heartily on the back. 
“ Why, man, I have n’t seen you so glum 
for a coon’s age,—not since I located you 

in the—er—er-” 

“ Yes—I know—in the attic on Sacra¬ 
mento Street, where I made my own bed 
and ate my own grub,—whenever I could 
get hold of any,” he added evenly, with¬ 
out a trace of emotion. “ But, Cartright, 
things are so different now. You don’t 
know what these few weeks have meant to 
me, since I have been able to live like a 
human being, and not like a starving ani¬ 
mal. Why—I feel like a bird set free 
from its cage. For the first time since 
coming to Harvard I have been able to 
enter life on equal terms with the other 
fellows. I seem to breathe a new air. 
That’s why, Cartright,” he went on 
earnestly, “ I have so often implored you 
to tell me the name of the man who has 
helped me. I feel so—so rotten not to 
be able to thank him, and to express my 
determination to repay him. Just think 
—he must regard me as a mere object of 
charity—a pauper—” 




IOO 


Brown of Harvard 


“Now, that’ll do, Thorne,” inter¬ 
rupted the other with some heat. “ The 
chap that’s coughing up for you is n’t 
that kind of a man. He’s no mucker, 
and thinks that he’s only doing his duty. 
Moreover, did n’t we agree to let this sub¬ 
ject rest? When you are in a position to 
repay the loan, then I will give you the 
man’s name, but not before.” 

“ Oh, yes, I know,” returned Thorne, 
“ but I can’t help puzzling my brain over 
it. Honestly, old man, I’m like a child 
about the thing. The wonder of it comes 
between me and my work sometimes, and 
I find myself dreaming. There is only 
one thing that contents me, and that is 
the knowledge that this mysterious Un¬ 
known can’t be any of the rich set here at 
college, for of all the ungodly, purse- 
proud snobs, that crowd that just left 
here, headed by Madden and Brown, are 
the worst.” 

An odd smile flickered about Cart- 
right’s thin lips, and his eyes sparkled 
through his spectacles with an unaccus¬ 
tomed gleam of merriment. 


The Trials of a Head Coach ioi 


“ Oh, I don’t know,” he said at length, 
and with a marked embarrassment in his 
manner. “ They—they seem to be rather 
decent fellows.” 

“Decent!” retorted Thorne indig¬ 
nantly. “ You’ve never tutored up in 
that room! It makes my blood fairly 
boil to think of the way they treated me! 
Why, until you men got around me and 
persuaded me to go in for rowing, they 
did n’t seem to recognize the fact that 
I was a man like themselves. I was a 
sort of automaton to them—a mere 
machine without human feelings. They 
used to call me ‘ the grind ’ right to 
my face. It has been a little better 
since I’ve shown them I can row, but 
they never let me feel that I’m one of 
them.” 

“ But, my dear Thorne-” 

“ I know what you ’re thinking. I 
ought to be glad to have the tutoring to 
do. Well, I am; for every penny made 
brings me nearer to the payment of my 
debt and-” 

“And,” broke in Cartright smiling, 




102 


Brown of Harvard 


“ brings an additional comfort to your 
sister, Miss Marian, eh?” 

“Oh, well,” returned Thorne, his face 
flushing as if he had been detected in the 
perpetration of some reprehensible act, 
“ girls, you know—must have nice frocks 
and—things. And for that very reason 
I regret every day having gone in for the 
crew. A poor fellow such as I am has no 
business with athletics. The time it takes 
is all wasted.” 

“Nonsense!” exclaimed Cartright im¬ 
patiently. “ Just think what you owe to 
Harvard. What’s time or expense when 
we ’re up against this proposition of row¬ 
ing against England’s picked crew ? 
Why, don’t you know we want every good 
man that Harvard can turn out? And, 
by George, your daily exercise with the 
axe down there in the mountains of Ten¬ 
nessee has given you an enviable bunch 
of muscle, old man.” And, as illustrat¬ 
ing his point, Cartright fastened his long, 
skinny fingers about his companion’s 
biceps. 

“ Gee whiz—hard as nails! They all 


The Trials of a Head Coach 103 

tell me you ’re going to make stroke. Just 
think of it—stroke oar! Oh Lord, oh 
Lord,” he added, running his hand up and 
down his own meagre arm, “ if I had only 
been blessed with brawn instead of this 
mighty intellect! I would rather be 
stroke oar than class orator any day. 
But here come the fellows—Brown and 
his crowd. Now don’t get cocky, old 
sport; just spruce up and look pleasant.” 

Tom and Madden, Tubby and Thurs¬ 
ton came singing down the walk, pre¬ 
ceded by a small, wiry-looking individual, 
with a thin, aquiline nose, and deep-set, 
black, penetrating eyes. He wore a 
heavy sweater, despite the congenial 
warmth of the atmosphere, and his whole 
attitude was one of alertness, combined 
with an indefinable quality of authority. 
This important personage was none other 
than “ Bud ” Hall, the professional 
coach, who was very manifestly aware of 
the immense responsibility that rested 
upon his rather slender shoulders. On 
seeing Thorne he stopped short and ob¬ 
served in a tone of the deepest disgust: 


104 


Brown of Harvard 


“Oh, it’s you, is it? Why in hell 
was n’t you out to-day for practice? ” 

“ Why,” replied Thorne, in some con¬ 
fusion, “ I—I was too busy this afternoon 
—studying.” 

Mr. Hall drew himself up to his full 
five feet seven inches, folded his arms 
across his faded sweater, and surveyed 
the object of his wrath with a fine con¬ 
tempt, while Tom and his companions 
looked on with absorbed interest. 

“ Studying! So you was studying, eh? 
So that’s what you came to college for, is 
it- to fritter your valuable time away 
over books and lectures and such damned 
nonsense. Now you just listen to what I 
have to say. You’ve got to cut out the 
study habit if you expect to do anything 
in athletics. What the devil did you come 
to Harvard for, anyway, with all that 
bunch of muscle, and a natural trick for 
rowing? Do you think it’s right or de¬ 
cent to stick in a stuffy room reading a 
book, when you ought to be out working 
and doing your duty to the ’Varsity? ” 
Poor Thorne, despite the apparent ab- 


The Trials of a Head Coach 105 

surdity of the coach’s invective, realized 
that, after all, from the true college man’s 
point of view, it was in some measure 
justified. Taking Cartright’s arm he 
moved slowly down the walk. On reach¬ 
ing the corner, he turned and said, in a 
tone of apology: 

“ I’m very sorry, Mr. Hall. I ’ll try 
not to miss any more afternoons. But 
really, it was—it was unavoidable to-day.” 

When they were gone Hall turned to 
the others, the very picture of disgust. 

“ He’s—he’s a mucker.” 

“ Oh, I sa-ay,” protested Tom. 

“ Yes, he is,” the coach continued impet¬ 
uously, “ a mucker, a first-class mucker. 
The idea of a man of his build, taking 
a place in the squad, and then failing 
to show up for practice because he had 
to study! Of course, gents, understand 
me,—I know this is no Yale race, but that 
does n’t excuse a man for shirking his 
duty. We ’re up against a stiff proposi¬ 
tion, and every son-of-a-gun in that boat 
owes it to the college to do his damnedest.” 
Then turning abruptly to Tom, he backed 


106 Brown of Harvard 

off a few paces, and proceeded to “ size 
him up ” as if he had been a statuesque 
work of art. 

“ Oh, Kid, Kid,” he exclaimed despair¬ 
ingly, “ damn you, Kid, why have n’t you 
got a little more weight ? If you had, I’d 
put you in Thorne’s place in less time than 
you could shake a rabbit by the tail. Even 
as it is—you’d make the second-best 
stroke on the river, because you’ve got the 
nerve and the judgment.” 

Whereupon Hall stepped over to Tom 
and began to punch and pinch and poke 
and prod his anatomy in an appraising 
sort of way, as if he were a piece of human 
goods offered for sale. 

“ Look at that chest and those arms,” 
he cried, turning to the others, “ as hard 
as a crowbar!” Tom, feeling that the 
critical eyes of his friends were upon him, 
swelled out his chest to the bursting point, 
and folded his arms over it with the backs 
of his hands under his biceps, as is the 
weakness of athletes when on exhibition. 

“Ah, it’s a pity he can’t make the 
eight,” almost sobbed the coach, as he con- 


The Trials of a Head Coach 107 


tinued his pinching and prodding. 
“ He’s got the proper college spirit. No 
books for him. No, siree, not on your 
life. He ain’t going to spoil his chances 
by any too much studying. Fresh air— 
something doing every minute. He J s 
getting some good out of his college edu¬ 
cation. Why did n’t you grow a few 
more inches, Kid? ” 

Tom hesitated a moment, and then re¬ 
marked with a fine exhibition of humor, 

“ Well, I ’d been taller, Mr. Hall, fair 
sir, if there had n’t been so much of me 
turned over for feet.” 

As if moved by a common impulse, the 
others directed their gaze down at Tom’s 
pedal extremities. It must be admitted 
that they were, as their owner had inti¬ 
mated, rather large. His friends then, 
following the example set by the coach, 
and led by the industrious Tubby, began 
pinching and poking him critically, and 
with no great degree of tenderness in the 
arms, chest, stomach, thighs, and other 
available regions of his anatomy. 

“ Here, darn it all, fellows,” exclaimed 


io8 Brown of Harvard 

Tom in the midst of this highly interest¬ 
ing process, “ what the devil are you do¬ 
ing? I may want to use these ribs again.” 

But here the poking and the pinching 
ceased, and there was a sudden smoothing 
of hair, straightening of ties, and other 
matters of prinking that, on occasion, ob¬ 
tain among the sterner sex even as they 
do among their alleged weaker sisters. 

“ Cheese it, fellows,” whispered Thurs¬ 
ton, looking down the elm-lined walk that 
led to the yard where they were assembled, 
“ here come the girls! ” 

“ Come along, Happy,” cried Madden 
in a sudden access of excitement, “ let’s 
head them off.” He started down the 
walk with Thurston, when he was stopped 
by Tom. 

“ Say, Clax,” cried the latter, “ bring 
the girls here, won’t you? I’ve simply 
got to see Evelyn. She won’t answer any 

of my letters and-” 

“All right,” interrupted Madden, “ I ’ll 
trot ’em along. But don’t blame me if 
they give you the cold and stony. Come 
on, Happy.” And the two men fairly 



The Trials of a Head Coach 109 

raced down the walk to intercept their (of 
course) wholly unsuspecting prey. 

As they disappeared, Mr. Hall, the 
coach, turned disconsolately on his heel to 
follow them at a gait more in keeping with 
the dignity of his office. Just before turn¬ 
ing the corner he faced about and deliv¬ 
ered this Parthian shot at the unhappy 
Tom,—a world of significance in his voice: 

“ There’s more good athletes spoiled 
by this damned fussing than there is by 
studying! ” 


CHAPTER IX 

TUBBY TO THE RESCUE 

“ T SAY, Kid,” observed Tubby, his ej r es 
* wide open in childlike amazement, 
“ you don’t mean to say you ’re going to 
stay here and face the girls after that 
show-down in your room on April first— 
that April fool gag you worked on us, you 
know,” he added with a somewhat un¬ 
gainly attempt at facetiousness. 

For a second Tom’s face clouded with 
vexation—for a second only. Then his 
cheery good nature reasserted itself and 
he smiled down on the anxious counte¬ 
nance of his fat friend. 

“ Sure thing,” he replied confidently. 
“ Just keep your eyes on me—same as 
they are now.” 

Tubby sank limply on the bench, and 


no 


111 


Tubby to the Rescue 

looked, if possible, more hopelessly 
amazed than before. 

“Gee!” he exclaimed, after a pause, 
during which admiration began to mingle 
with his first sensation of astonishment, 
“ if I only had your nerve! Why, Kid, 
just think, a strange young woman in 
your room, and Evelyn there and her 
mother-” 

“ Oh, you dry up,” interrupted Tom 
brusquely, “ that was all right, and you 
know it was.” 

“ Yes, I know, Tom,” persisted the in¬ 
defatigable Tubby, whose strong point— 
provided of course that he had any par¬ 
ticular strong point saving and excepting 
his appetite—was perseverance, “ but 
Evelyn will turn you down! ” 

Tom grinned complacently, and, remov¬ 
ing his cap, made a futile attempt to 
smooth down his curly locks. 

“ I say, Kid,” insisted Tubby, with a 
friendly anxiety, “ she ’ll turn you down, 
and—and that ’ll make you look cheap.” 

“All the better,” replied Tom cheer¬ 
fully. “She’s a woman, isn’t she? 



112 


Brown of Harvard 


Well, if I look cheap, she won’t be able to 
resist the bargain.” Whereupon he 
laughed gleefully, quite delighted with the 
exquisite humor of his repartee. 

“All right, you may think you ’re aw¬ 
fully funny,” said Tubby, with dolorous 
foreboding, “ but you just wait and see. 
She ’ll make you look like a two-spot.” 

“ Oh, quit it, Tubby. I guess I know 
girls better than you, and-” 

“Yes,” interjected Tubby dryly, “ I 
guess you do.” 

Disregarding the sinister significance 
of this retort, Tom went on. 

“ Now, look here, Tub,—I want you to 
do me a favor, that’s a good fellow. I 
want you to get Thurston out of the way 
when they come. You know he ’ll be 
hanging on like a leech, and—well, I want 
to see Evelyn alone. I’ve got something 
awfully important to say to her.” 

Tubby looked up at him quizzically. 

“ Yes,” he said, “ I’ve no doubt you 
have; got to make yourself solid with her, 
eh? Gee, what a nerve! Tom, honest, 
I would like to accommodate you, but how 



Tubby to the Rescue 113 

the deuce am I to get Happy out of the 
way? It would take a good-sized cyclone 
to blow him off the map when Evelyn is 
about. Why, you couldn’t pry him off 
with a burglar’s jimmy. Besides,” he 
added dejectedly, “ you know I’m no 
good thinking of things; that is—not 
until it’s too late. 

I T 1 tell you what I ’ll do to make it 
an object,” said Tom stepping up to him 
as if seized with a sudden inspiration. “ If 
you can fix things so that I will be left 
alone with Evelyn for five minutes after 
they get here, I ’ll blow you off to seven 
consecutive dinners at the Touraine, after 
the race. You can go as far as you like.” 

Tubby gazed at his friend wistfully for 
a moment, and then sadly shook his head. 

“ No, Tom, it won’t do. It would n’t 
be decent to be bribed to do a favor for a 
friend.” 

“Bribe nothing!” rejoined Tom. 
“You can regard those dinners as a slight 
token of esteem for your display of friend¬ 
ship. Why, it’s perfectly regular. 


H4 


Brown of Harvard 


That’s the way all big business affairs are 
conducted.” 

“ No, is it though? ” said Tubby, visibly 
weakening and unconsciously smacking 
his lips. “ Honest, Kid, I don’t want to 
sponge, but, after all, the job’s worth the 
money.” 

“ You ’ll do it then, Tubby? ” inquired 
Tom eagerly. 

“ Oh, confound it all, Kid, you know 
I’m no diplomat.” 

“ Cheese it,” whispered Tom, “ here they 
are! You needn’t be diplomatic,—just 
—just do anything that’s necessary.” 

Tom and Tubby then retreated to the 
dormitory steps, as Madden and Edith 
and Thurston and Evelyn loitered into 
view around the corner and stopped under 
the big elm. The girls were togged out 
in their finest undress uniform, and, all 
things considered, neither Madden nor 
Thurston was particularly to blame for 
the very evident devotion that either be¬ 
trayed toward his respective convoy. For 
a few minutes they engaged in a delight¬ 
fully inane conversation, laughing and 


Tubby to the Rescue 115 

rattling on as is the custom with young 
men and young women when they are 
concerned merely with the joy of each 
other’s presence. 

Soon, however, Madden turned toward 
the steps, and remarking the two rather 
lugubrious figures, seated thereon, ex¬ 
claimed, with a fine assumption of 
surprise: 

“ Why, hello, Kid! You here? ” 

Tom glanced significantly at the two 
girls, who appeared to be wholly unaware 
of his presence, and then drawled out in 
his characteristic monotone: 

“ It seems not, my dear fellow.” 

After a pause, during which the young 
women continued blissfully ignorant of 
his existence, he added: 

“ Good afternoon, er—Miss Ames— 
Miss Sinclair.” 

Edith turned around and directed at 
him a gaze calculated to freeze a salaman¬ 
der, while Evelyn appeared to be more 
absorbed than ever in the elevating and 
inspiring conversation of Mr. Happy 
Thurston. 


n6 Brown of Harvard 

“ Did any one speak? ” asked Tom with 
a desperate resort to jocularity. 

No answer being vouchsafed to this ap¬ 
peal, Tubby, who began to feel the full 
responsibilities of his contract, played his 
initial card, though, as will appear, it was 
no trump. 

“ Eh—eh—how do you do, Miss 
Ames? ” 

Evelyn turned upon him with a beam¬ 
ing countenance: 

“ Oh, how are you, Mr. Anderson,” she 
remarked effusively; “it’s been such a 
long time since I saw you! ” 

“ Sure thing,” replied the somewhat 
discomfited Tubby, “ not since—er—the 
day before yesterday. I say, Thurston,” 
he went on, with manifest irrelevance, 
“ those fish eggs we were watching down 
at the lab. have all hatched out. The fish 
has—er—er—been sitting on them for a 
month. Let’s you and me go down and 
see ’em.” 

The party under the tree turned, with 
one accord, and stared at Tubby as if he 
had been an exhibit at a dime museum. 



Thurston renewed his intimate, animated conversation. 































. 








Tubby to the Rescue 117 

As for Tom, he hugged his knees in an 
agony of exasperation, ending by shaking 
his fist covertly at his unfortunate 
accomplice. 

“ Ye—es,” said Tom after the astonish¬ 
ment had in some degree subsided, 
“ Tubby is so devoted to biology, you 
know.” 

^ r Z?£-ology!” remarked Thurston, with 
exquisite sarcasm. “ It is n’t biology, it’s 
fry-ology. Tubby likes to watch the eggs 
hatch and think how many millions of 
good edible fish they will make some day. 
Not for me this afternoon, Tubby. I've 
got something far more important on hand 
just now! ” 

“ Talking about fish, I guess you ’ve 
been hooked all right,” retorted Tubby. 

Thurston, however, paid him no atten¬ 
tion, but turned to his companion, and, 
with lowered head, renewed his intimate, 
animated conversation. 

Tubby subsided on the steps and, bury¬ 
ing his head in his hands, abandoned 
himself to the awful effort of devising 
some other scheme that would serve to 


Brown of Harvard 


118 

detach the adhesive Happy from his fair 
companion. 

In the meantime, Tom was engaged in 
an expressive, if violent, pantomime with 
Madden, the plain import of which was 
that his chum should at least partly clear 
the atmosphere by removing Edith from 
the sphere of action. Prompted by this 
very palpable hint, Madden looked at 
Edith inquiringly, as much as to say, 
“ Shall we? ” And Edith with ready 
feminine finesse nodded an unmistakable 
“ Yes.” 

“ Evie,” she said, “ we ’ll meet you at 
Vespers, if you don’t mind. Mr. Mad¬ 
den wants to show me—er—the glass 
flowers in the museum.” 

Evelyn watched their retreating forms, 
and then turned to Thurston, smiling: 

“They evidently don’t want us,” she said. 

“No more than we want them,” re¬ 
turned Thurston with the imbecile grin of 
a devoted admirer. 

“ I’ve got to wait here,” continued 
Evelyn. “ I—I—want to see Wilton. 
He said he’d be back about five.” 


Tubby to the Rescue 119 

The two seated themselves on the bench 
and continued their absorbed conversa¬ 
tion. Evelyn appeared to be immensely 
interested and amused by the strenuous 
efforts of her companion, and from time 
to time broke into hearty, uncontrollable 
peals of laughter, so hearty and uncon¬ 
trollable, in fact, as to suggest a slight 
suspicion of insincerity. 

Tom, however, seemed not to notice 
this. For the first time since his sweet¬ 
heart had arrived on the scene, his manner 
began to betray a certain lack of its ac¬ 
customed confidence, and he ultimately 
developed a deep and settled gloom. For 
several minutes he remained seated on the 
steps of the dormitory, while he gazed de¬ 
spondently down upon the happy couple 
before him. Then, unable to bear the 
tantalizing sight longer, he gave Tubby, 
who sat close by his side, a vigorous nudge, 
and whispered: 

“ Get busy, will you? ” 

Tubby straightened himself up, hemmed 
and hawed for a few seconds, in a 
“ parturiunt montes ” fashion, and then, 


120 


Brown of Harvard 


after a desperate pause, sang out 
miserably: 

“ Say, Thursty—let ’s you and me go— 
go look for violets! ” 

Tom buried his head deep in his hands 
and groaned aloud, while Thurston de¬ 
tached himself from his consort long 
enough to turn around and inquire, with 
blighting scorn: 

“What’s the matter with you? Got 
’em again? ” 

But here an extraordinary phenomenon 
occurred. Tubby suddenly rose from his 
seat, the bright light of inspiration shin¬ 
ing in his eyes, and, after a few whispered 
words to Tom, darted enthusiastically 
into the dormitory. A broad grin re¬ 
placed the gloom in Tom’s countenance, 
and there was cheer and hope in his voice 
as he once more addressed the couple on 
the bench. 

“ I suppose I’m de trop ” he remarked 
dryly, with the accent on the final “ p.” 

The others paid him not the slightest 
attention. In fact Evelyn fairly ex¬ 
ploded with laughter at the perpetration 


Tubby to the Rescue 


I 21 


of some exquisite bon mot of her friend. 
At this moment Billy, the postman, swung 
around the corner, to deliver the evening 
mail at the dormitory. 

“ Hello, Billy,” exclaimed Tom, “ did 
you leave a letter for me? ” 

“ No, sir, Mr. Brown, not to-night, sir.” 

“ That’s too bad,” replied Tom with 
significant distinctness. “ I ’ve written 
four times this week to one girl and she 
hasn’t answered yet. Now, Billy, what 
do you think of that? ” 

Billy shook his head sadly, evidently 
melted with sympathy. 

“ It looks bad, Mr. Brown,” he said, as 
he passed through the door. “ Night, sir.” 

“ I sa—ay, Happy,” cried Tom, once 
more coming to the attack, “ I suppose 
I’m in the way —de trop don’t you 
know? ” 

Again Thurston condescended to make 
reply. Glancing at Tom over his shoul¬ 
der, he said reassuringly: 

“ Oh, not at all, old man. Keep your 
seat and make yourself perfectly at home.” 

“Did the lady speak?” inquired Tom 


I 22 


Brown of Harvard 


anxiously, “ for I fear I must be going.” 

“ Oh,” replied Thurston rising and lift¬ 
ing his cap in an elaborate salute, “ don’t 
let us keep you.” 

At this moment there was a sound of 
revelry within the dormitory,—a succes¬ 
sion of shrieks and demoniacal howls, and 
in an instant Tubby appeared in the door¬ 
way, his eyes fairly popping with excite¬ 
ment and joy, followed by a crowd of 
students. When they caught sight of 
Thurston chatting amiably with his fair 
companion, they set up an exhilarating 
war-whoop, and rushing forward pell-mell 
down the steps, without any perceptible 
pause in their activity, swept that unfor¬ 
tunate young man from his feet in the 
twinkling of an eye, and carried him— 
struggling, fighting, and vigorously pro¬ 
testing—on their shoulders down the walk 
with a wild shout of triumph that soon de¬ 
veloped into a glad psean of victory. 

Tubby, however, stopped long enough 
to observe to Tom in a wholly pardonable 
tone of exultation: 

“ I said I was n’t a diplomat, Kid. 


Tubby to the Rescue 123 

I just used force, you know—worked up 
a cyclone. Seven dinners at the Tou- 
raine! Gee! ” 

And then he lumbered lightly off after 
his organized gang of banditti. 


CHAPTER X 

ON PROBATION 

S the tumult and the shouting died 



** away in the foliated distance of the 
yard, Tom slowly approached his sweet¬ 
heart, cap in hand, his face lighted up with 
its accustomed grin of good fellowship, 
his eyes fairly dancing with the gleam of 
anticipated joy. As for Evelyn, she 
turned her back abruptly and retreated 
to the tree, where she stood with a highly 
suspicious shaking of the shoulders. Tom 
stood still for a moment and then edged 
still nearer. 

“ I told Tubby,” he said, in a polite 
tone of explanation, “ that he need n’t 
mind being diplomatic. And—and I 
don’t really think he was, do you, dear? ” 

Evelyn drew herself together stiffly, 
and replied freezingly: 


124 



“I told Tubby that he needn’t mind being diplomatic 
















































A 

4 
































% 















W* • 








































if 


V 





























































On Probation 


125 


“ Don’t you dare to call me dear, sir! ” 

“ Oh,” said Tom, apparently discon¬ 
certed, “ beg pardon—I—I really thought 
you were dear, don’t you know. No of¬ 
fence, no offence.” 

For reply Evelyn flounced away from 
him and retreated to the other side of the 
tree. Tom followed docilely. 

“ Happy,—Thurston,—Mr. Thurston, 
you know, did n’t even stop to say good¬ 
bye,” he ventured, offering the olive branch 
of peace and forgiveness. Evelyn tapped 
the ground impatiently with her foot, but 
it was evident that she was thawing 
rapidly under the melting influence of 
Tom’s congenial warmth. 

“ It was very impolite of him,” con¬ 
tinued Tom hopefully. 

Evelyn, unable to hold in longer, burst 
into a peal of laughter. 

“ Oh,—you are too—too absurd. But 
it was funny. Mr. Thurston looked so 
—surprised.” Whereupon she put her 
handkerchief to her face and giggled 
tumultuously. 

“I would never have left you so rudely,” 


126 


Brown of Harvard 


went on Tom, gradually working around 
to Evelyn’s side of the tree. 

“ Tom Brown,” she exclaimed, turn¬ 
ing suddenly upon him, “ I never saw 
such assurance. You needn’t think I’m 
laughing because I’m pleased with you, 
for I’m not.” In spite of this assertion, 
however, the bright film of tears in her 
eyes seemed to indicate that her displeas¬ 
ure was not wholly of an incurable 
character. 

“ Still,” persisted Tom, resting one 
hand against the trunk of the tree, “ you 
don’t feel quite so angry as you did, now 
do you? ” 

“ Tom—Mr. Brown, I mean, I—I just 
hate you! ” 

For some mysterious reason, Tom did 
not seem to be in the least discomfited by 
this discouraging statement. Instead, he 
drew still nearer—so near that his hand, 
in a wholly accidental fashion, closed upon 
hers as it rested on the trunk of the tree. 

“No—you don’t hate me, Evie. You 
love me.” 

Evelyn snatched her hand from his. 


On Probation 


127 


“ How dare you, sir!” she exclaimed 
with a very dramatic indignation, as she 
started toward the walk. 

Tom jumped nimbly in front of her 
and barred the way. 

“ Well, Evelyn,” he said composedly, 
“ it’s just this way. I’ve reasoned the 
whole thing out after a good deal of—of 
study. You know this thing is like a 
problem in mathematics, and I’m very 
fond of mathematics. You see, there’s 
Miss Sinclair—Edith—who was in the 
room that day. She was n’t so awfully 
angry. At least she speaks to me, and 
even your mother promised to forget the 
incident after I had explained to her, and 
she went so far as to say that, if I was a 
very good little boy, I might come to see 
you again. But,” and here he adopted 
the tone of one whose logic is irresistible, 
“but you—you won’t forgive me. Now 
what does that prove? Why, simply 
that the matter must have gone deeper 
with you than with the others. And so,” 
he wound up triumphantly, “ I know you 
do care—a whole lot! ” 


128 Brown of Harvard 

For a moment Evelyn appeared stunned 
by the overwhelming conclusiveness of 
Tom’s argument, but, as it was entirely 
too early to abandon her attitude of 
hauteur, she resorted to a subtle, if some¬ 
what common, feminine device. 

“ Well,” she said eventually, “ mother 
may do as she likes, but—but I don’t con¬ 
sider the explanation you gave her at all 
satisfactory.” 

“No?” replied Tom in apparent de¬ 
jection. “ Why, I—I thought it was a 
bully explanation. It took me a long 
time to fix it up, you know. No—I don’t 
mean that,” he added in some alarm. 
“ What I told your mother was the truth, 
but if you are not satisfied with it, I can 
give you an entirely different explanation 
—only you must let me have a little time.” 

Evelyn looked up at him, half amused, 
half vexed, struggling between her girlish 
inclination to take the whole thing as she 
knew it to be,—a mere accident in which 
her beloved Tom had been unfortunately 
involved,—and her feminine sense of 
wounded pride. 


On Probation 


129 


“ Oh, Tom,” she said with a pretty little 
gesture of impatience, “ how can you be 
so provoking? Why don’t you be frank 
with me? ” 

Perceiving an opening for another of 
his dainty bon mots, Tom replied airily: 

44 How can I be Frank with you, when 
I am Tom with everybody else? ” 

This was too much even for Evelyn. 
Once more she started off haughtily down 
the walk, but once more Tom interposed 
his considerable form in her path and 
barred her progress. 

44 Now look here, Evie,” he said ear¬ 
nestly, with arms outstretched on either 
side as if Evelyn were a stray hen that he 
was shooing back to her proper habitat, 
44 why don’t you trust me? I can’t go into 
all the details about how that girl, Miss 
Thorne, happened to be in my room with¬ 
out implicating some one else—not Mad¬ 
den, of course. There ’s nothing—er— 
crooked. Everything’s all right, and you 
must believe me, dear. All I can say is 
that there was no disloyalty to you in her 
being there. You believe that, don’t 


130 


Brown of Harvard 


you?” he inquired eagerly, looking at 
her beseechingly with his ingenuous blue 
eyes. “ Why, gee whiz, Evie—you know 
I’m no gay Lothario, no Don Quixote 
—or was he the chap that—-now, 
come, there’s a good girl,” he added, tak¬ 
ing her gently by the hand, “ let’s sit 
down. It’s lots more comfortable than 
standing.” 

Evelyn, very manifestly weakening 
under Tom’s persistent attacks, seated 
herself gingerly at the end of the bench, 
as far removed as possible from her lover. 
The latter, however, promptly slid up to¬ 
ward her until he was within comfortable 
range. 

“ Now, hang it all, Evie,” he said, “ this 
spirit of suspicion is a bad thing. If a 
wife can’t trust her husband-” 

“ Tom! ” she cried, turning on him in¬ 
dignantly, “How dare you talk so? 
You ’re not my husband.” 

“ Why,” drawded Tom after a moment 
apparently devoted to profound delibera¬ 
tion, “ that’s so—you ’re right, Evie. I 
—I was anticipating. But,” he went on 


On Probation 


I 3 I 

cheerfully, “ you know I’m going to be 
your husband all right.” 

Upon saying which he reached deliber¬ 
ately over and, removing a bunch of vio¬ 
lets from her waist, attempted to fasten 
them in the lapel of his coat with a delight¬ 
ful air of unconcern. Evelyn however, 
before the process was half completed, 
snatched them away from him. 

“ Why, Tom,” she cried indignantly— 
“ how dare you! ” 

“As I was saying,” continued Tom 
wholly unperturbed, though he cast a 
rueful glance at the somewhat mangled 
violets, “ as I was saying, the only way to 
be happy is to be trustful. When you 
come down to cases—er—I mean, when 
you come down to the truth, there’s no 
use asking an honorable, upright man 
about anything he does n’t want you to 
know. He ’ll be sure to tell you li—fibs; 
so you might just as well be serene and 
hope for the best and—and love the brute 
in spite of all his faults. And then—why, 
you ’ll be surprised how happy we ’ll be.” 

This eloquent appeal had its desired ef- 


I 3 2 


Brown of Harvard 


feet. Evelyn once more placed her hand¬ 
kerchief to her face to hide her smiling. 
Tom, perceiving the advantage he had 
gained, began to press it home. Remov¬ 
ing a ring from his waistcoat pocket, he 
continued: 

“ I say, Evie, just let me put this ring 
on again—there’s a nice girl. You will, 
won’t you, dear? ” 

Evelyn remained silent. 

“You don’t know how broken up I was 
when you sent it back,” went on Tom with 
a certain clumsy earnestness. “ I’m not 
much on talk—like Happy for instance— 
but you know, Evelyn, there’s never been 
anybody but you for me since I first saw 
you. It seems to run in our family. 
There’s the governor; he could n’t see any 
other proposition than my mother. She 
was ‘ it ’ ever since he was a boy and—oh, 
hang it, Evie! Let me put the ring on.” 

“No! No!” cried Evelyn, drawing 
away from him again. “ It was foolish 
anyway—your pledging yourself before 
your college days were over, before you ’d 
really known any other girls.” 


On Probation 


133 


“ Oh, confound it all, Evie,” exclaimed 
Tom impatiently, “ you know, there 
are nt any other girls! ” 

And there is where Tom made his ten- 
strike. You may argue with a girl, you 
may plead with her, you may convince her 
beyond all possibility of a doubt without 
in the least affecting her conduct. But 
once let her believe that she is the only 
one, then, well, it will be different. And 
thus it was that Evelyn, casting a sly, 
relenting glance on the eager countenance 
of her sweetheart, gently disengaged the 
violets from her waist. 

“ Well, Tom,” she said shyly, while she 
slipped the bouquet into his hand, “ you 
may—have these. I’m sorry I took them 
from you so rudely just now. But I 
won’t take the ring—no—not yet. Per¬ 
haps, if,—well, perhaps, you may come to 
see me-” 

In the exuberance of his joy, Tom seized 
her about the waist and attempted to 
kiss her. 

“No, Tom, stop!” she cried, putting 
him away firmly. “ Bemember, sir, I 



134 


Brown of Harvard 


have n’t altogether forgiven you yet. I 
may forgive you some day,—but not yet. 
And you ’re not to try to kiss me—or— 
anything like that, for a long, long time. 
You’re only on probation!” 


CHAPTER XI 

VICTOR COLTON 

TF you should ask the average Harvard 
A man just when Victor Colton had 
graduated with his degree of B.A., said 
Harvard man would have, in all proba¬ 
bility, been “ stumped ” for a reply. Col¬ 
ton was regarded as an institution in him¬ 
self. It was rumored that he was pursuing 
a post-graduate course, and, during the 
passage of the years, he had taken on a 
sort of double aspect—half student, half 
alumnus, and yet neither one nor the 
other. A similar mystery shrouded the 
exact character of his graduate studies. 
No one ever seemed to have seen or heard 
of him in a lecture-room or laboratory. 
He was wholly unknown at the library 
and, as for attendance at chapel, such a 
thing would have been regarded in the 
135 


136 


Brown of Harvard 


nature of a phenomenon. Some one had 
facetiously observed that, though Colton 
was pursuing a post-graduate course, he 
never seemed quite able to catch up with 
it. And yet he was commendably per¬ 
sistent, for, though students came to the 
University and graduated with machine¬ 
like regularity, Colton stayed on forever. 

He was what the society columns would 
term a “ well-groomed ” man; always neat 
in appearance, clean-shaven, and quite 
immaculate as to such rather adventitious 
aids to personal adornment as patent 
leather shoes, gloves, hats “ in season,” 
and walking-stick. No one ever remem¬ 
bered to have seen him in “ sneakers,” a 
sweater, flannel trousers, or a cap. In¬ 
deed, as far as accoutrement went, he 
seemed, in contrast with the great body 
of students, like some rare exotic,—a 
wholly paradoxical garden plant in that 
gay, luxuriant growth of wild flowers. 

The uncertainty that surrounded his 
status as a student also attached to his 
personality. For, though obviously older 
than the average college man, it would be 


Victor Colton 


i 37 


difficult to say just how old he was. He 
might have been twenty-five,—he might 
have been thirty; no one would have been 
surprised to learn that either was the case. 

The one definite thing known about 
Colton was his devoted attachment to 
Freshmen, especially to Freshmen who 
received liberal allowances from their not 
over-judicious parents. He fastened him¬ 
self upon them with an ardor that was in 
direct ratio to the amount of spare change 
at their disposal, and, as Tom had inti¬ 
mated in his warning to Ames, was a con¬ 
stant and faithful tutor in that branch of 
the curriculum not scheduled in the Uni¬ 
versity catalogue—the great American 
science of poker. That his pupils paid 
liberally for the instruction they received 
at his hands was, perhaps, no more than 
just, considering the time and labor he 
devoted to their education. It was gener¬ 
ally rumored that this was, indeed, his 
“ post-graduate course,” that he earned a 
very respectable income at this engaging, 
if somewhat irregular, branch of research. 
If that were so, however, no one had ever 


Brown of Harvard 


13S 

made direct complaint of him. His vic¬ 
tims—if they were such—were character¬ 
istically reticent as to their losses, and, 
observing the unwritten code in such mat¬ 
ters, never made the slightest “ squeal.’’ 

Colton’s “ friendships ” were not wholly 
confined to Freshmen. He numbered 
also among his associates certain upper 
classmen who, lacking either training or 
character, discovered a certain congenial¬ 
ity in the stronger, more virile personal¬ 
ity of this man who well knew how, by 
flattery and cajolery, to clothe them with 
a sort of vicarious importance. This lat¬ 
ter class included Wilton Ames. Dis¬ 
sipated and nervous wreck that he was, he 
found in Colton what he regarded as a 
sympathetic, congenial companion, a man 
who, instead of “ lecturing ” him and find¬ 
ing fault with his weaknesses, metaphori¬ 
cally patted him on the back, and, for 
purposes of revenue only, made him be¬ 
lieve that he was a very good fellow who 
was suffering from lack of appreciation 
and sympathy. In fact, as between Col¬ 
ton and Ames, it was a typical case of the 


Victor Colton 


*39 


spider and the fly,—the fly being invaria¬ 
bly willing, if not eager, to walk into the 
parlor. 

The day when Tom had once more es¬ 
tablished diplomatic relations with Evelyn 
found Ames in Colton’s rooms over at 
Dunster. No one would have suspected, 
from a cursory view of the apartment, that 
Colton was not a devoted student. In 
one corner was a grand piano, on the rack 
of which was a bound volume of Bee¬ 
thoven’s sonatas. The walls were lined 
with book shelves, which were filled with 
books, all of a respectable literary char¬ 
acter. In the centre of the room was a 
large, square-top reading desk, littered 
with books and papers. The floor was 
covered with a rich, heavy rug, while, de¬ 
spite the warmth of the atmosphere, a 
cheery wood fire burned on the andirons 
in the fireplace. 

It would, perhaps, be ungracious to ex¬ 
plain that all these elaborate fittings were 
a part of Colton’s stock in trade; that they 
were cunningly designed to lend him the 
character of that which he was not—a man 


i4o Brown of Harvard 

of literary and studious habits; that he 
did n’t know a Beethoven sonata from 
Bach’s Mass in B Minor; that the books 
were seldom if ever removed from their 
places on the shelves; that the desk could, 
in the twinkling of an eye, be converted 
into a very serviceable poker table. What¬ 
ever the purpose for which the room was 
so elaborately fitted up, it must be allowed 
that the fittings were in excellent taste. 

Colton was lounging easily in an arm¬ 
chair smoking a cigar, while Ames sat 
rather dejectedly at the desk, toying nerv¬ 
ously with an ivory paper-cutter. For 
a long time they had remained thus in si¬ 
lence, Colton occasionally eyeing his com¬ 
panion with a very palpable contempt. 
At length, flinging the remnant of his 
cigar into the fireplace, he spoke. 

“ Look here, Ames,—what a grouch 
you have on! What’s the matter, old 
man? ” 

Ames made no reply other than tapping 
the desk nervously with the paper-cutter. 

“ Ever since you’ve been on the water 
wagon,” continued Colton, a shade of 


Victor Colton 141 

genuine vexation clouding his face, “ you 
have n’t been fit company for man or 
beast. What the deuce has got into you? 
You’ve got no right to treat me so, when 
you know I’m one of your best friends. 
Come on over to town to-night, and let’s 
have a little try at Billy Moran’s. No 
big game, you know, just a little quiet 
seance.” 

“ No, I won’t,” replied Ames abruptly. 
And then, after a moment of nervous si¬ 
lence, he went on: 

“ Why can’t you let me alone, Colton, 
when I am trying to be decent? ” 

“Let you alone!” returned the other 
with considerable heat. “ If that’s what 
you want, I ’ll let you alone, all right. By 
Jove,—why, you talk as though we were 
a sort of Mephisto and Faust proposition. 
You ’re a nice, sweet, innocent little 
Faust, are n’t you? ” 

Ames looked up at him sharply, a 
sudden dread sweeping over his pale 
countenance. 

“ What—what do you mean, Colton? ” 
“ Well,” continued the other, as if he 


142 


Brown of Harvard 


had not heard, “ you can’t say I’ve had 
anything to do with the mess you Ve got 
into with your Marguerite, anyhow.” 
And then rising, as if about to leave, he 
added: 

“ By-by, until you are in a better 
humor.” 

“ What do you mean? ” asked Ames 
hoarsely. 

44 Why—I’m going—that’s all.” 

44 No—no,” the other insisted. 44 What 
do you mean by what you said just now 
about—about the girl? ” 

44 Oh, now, look here, Ames,” replied the 
older man as he stopped suddenly at the 
threshold and walked slowly back toward 
the table where his companion sat huddled 
like some stricken creature, 44 don’t you 
imagine for an instant that I’m not wise 
to all that about the girl. Why,” he said 
with a sinister smile of contempt as he sur¬ 
veyed the poor, weak figure before him, 
44 you tell everything you know when 
you ’re in a sympathetic mood—when you 
don’t realize what you ’re saying, don’t 
you know? Oh, yes, I know all about 


Victor Colton 


i43 


it,” he went on in a louder tone as Ames 
made a feeble gesture of protest. 
“ You Ve given yourself dead away, old 
man. You might just as well have put it 
all down in an affidavit. You Ve poured 
your troubles into my sympathizing ear, 
time and time again. Lord—how you Ve 
bored me about that girl, about how you 
intended to elope with her. Poor Miss 
Thorne,” he added, looking down at Ames 
with the stealthy gaze of an animal steal¬ 
ing upon its prey. “ Poor, innocent 
girl! ” 

Ames sprawled his arms on the desk 
and buried his face in his hands, trem¬ 
bling convulsively in the effort to conceal 
his emotion. 

“ Poor innocent girl,” repeated Colton 
distinctly, in a tone as hard as flint. 
“ How could you, damn it all, Ames?— 
But here—see here, old fellow,” he said, 
assuming a friendly manner, “ don’t feel 
so broken up about it. It’s a bad busi¬ 
ness,—but then I Ve always been a good 
chum of yours, so cheer up. Come, cheer 
up, do you hear? ” he said, shaking Ames 


144 


Brown of Harvard 


roughly by the shoulder. “ It ’ll all come 
out right in the end. Remember, as I 
said, I’m a good friend of yours, and we 
sha’n’t let a little thing like this spoil it 
all. Come along over to town and let’s 
make a night of it. Come on, will you? ” 

For a few moments there was a silence 
broken only by the crackling of the burn¬ 
ing logs in the fireplace. Then Ames, 
pulling himself together with an effort, re¬ 
plied in a voice choking with agitation: 

“ Oh, let me alone, Colton! You know 
I can’t go if I would. I—I have n’t any 
money.” 

“As if that made any difference be¬ 
tween boon companions,” replied Colton 
with an attempt to adopt an air of good 
fellowship, though his voice was distinctly 
patronizing. “ Now, understand me, old 
man, I want to help you. I’m not going 
to quarrel with you in spite of your surly 
conduct. I like you, Ames; there’s 
something about you that appeals to me, 
and I want to help you out of this hole 
you ’re in. Why, confound it, man, I 
asked you over especially to-day to put 


Victor Colton 


*45 


you in the way of making a nice little sum 
of money.” 

Ames looked up at him, pale, haggard, 
his eyes bloodshot. Hardened though he 
was, Colton’s face flushed before his 
friend’s searching, anxious, half-suspect- 
ing gaze. 

“ What do you want me to do? ” asked 
Ames in a tone that was scarcely audible. 

“ Oh, hang it all, old fellow, don’t put 
on so much agony,” replied the other with 
a gruff attempt to appear at ease. “ You 
need money, don’t you? A few hundred 
would come in very handy, eh? Well, I 
repeat, I can put you in the way of pick¬ 
ing up a comfortable little purse just for 
the trouble of—er—of stooping for it.” 

“Stooping for it?” repeated Ames 
blankly. “ What do you mean by stoop¬ 
ing for it? ” 

“ Well—er,—,” replied Colton, con¬ 
fused and embarrassed in spite of himself, 
“ I suppose you’d call it stooping. It’s 
no uncommon thing though. You see, 
the odds on the race are two to one on the 
’Varsity against the Englishmen.” 


146 Brown of Harvard 

“ I know that; but I have n’t any money 
to bet.” 

“Ah, I am perfectly aware of that,” re¬ 
plied Colton, with an evil leer, “ but I 
have, and I’m placing every penny I can 
lay my hands on on the English crew, be¬ 
cause they are going to win—and,” here 
he leaned over and almost whispered into 
Ames’s ear, “ and it is you who will be the 
cause of their winning! ” 

Ames drew back, his hands working 
nervously, his manner a mingling of dread 
and indignation. 

“ I don’t understand you! ” he said at 
length. “ I don’t know what you ’re 
talking about!” 

“Oh, you don’t?” replied Colton, 
rapidly regaining his self-assurance as he 
noticed his friend’s agitation. “ Well, 
I ’ll explain. It’s very simple. This 
fellow Thorne—your friend Madden’s 
tutor and,—ahem—the brother of the 
young lady whom you-” 

“For God’s sake, Colton, cut it out. 
What are you driving at? ” 

“ Well, this chap Thorne is the key- 



Victor Colton 147 

stone of the crew. He is the whole show, 
and he alone is responsible for the great 
work that the crew is doing. Why, he 
fairly lifts that boat over the short course 
between the Longwood Bridge and the 
Union Boat Club. It is his work that has 
enabled the crew to beat all records over 
that course in practice. It is his work that 
is sending the odds up in favor of the 
’Varsity. They have n’t a substitute in 
his class.” 

“ Well,” cried Ames impatiently as the 
other stopped. 44 What do you mean? 
Where do I come in? ” 

44 Oh—so you ’re not 4 on ’ yet? Well, 
I ’ll be a little more particular. What I 
mean is, that Thorne is n’t going to row.” 

44 What! Thorne not row?” repeated 
Ames in genuine amazement. 

44 That’s exactly what I mean. Thorne 
is n’t going to row. On the morning of 
the 30th, just before the race, his sister, 
Miss Marian, is going to leave Cambridge 
suddenly. See?” 

44 Look here, Colton,” cried Ames, 
springing from his seat impetuously. 


148 


Brown of Harvard 


“ what in hell are you proposing to me ? 
Do you expect me to betray my own col¬ 
lege, my own friends? Damn it all, Col¬ 
ton, I may be no account, weak and good 
for nothing, but if I’m capable of such 
treachery—such rottenness—as you seem 
to think, why, then I want to lie down and 
die right now! I don’t want to go on 
living.” 

“Oh, is that so?” returned the other 
with a sneer, “ you don’t want to go on 
living, eh? What a nice little Sunday- 
school scholar you are, to be sure. How 
noble, how consistent! You would n’t be¬ 
tray your college, but you would run 
away with-” 

“ Stop! ” shouted Ames desperately, 
“I tell you, man, stop!” 

“Oh, no!” exclaimed Colton, with 
mock surprise, “ you don’t really mean to 
say that you ’re sensitive on that subject? 
Now, look here, old man,” he continued, 
assuming his confidential, sympathetic 
tone, “ you ’re no worse than lots of other 
fellows; you’ve merely been—well, injudi¬ 
cious. And w r hat is it I ask of you? Of 



Victor Coiton 


H9 


course you intend to marry the girl, and 
all I want is that you have her leave Cam¬ 
bridge a little sooner than she otherwise 
would—to be precise, on the morning of 
the 30th. I ’ll see to it that Thorne learns 
of her departure before the race, and you 
may depend upon it, he ’ll rush off to hunt 
her up. He’s mighty fond of her, I 
believe—eh?” he added significantly. 
“And if the Englishmen win, as they 
must, with Harvard deprived of her 
stroke oar, why—I owe you $500. Shall 
I put that down as a bet? ” he asked, tak¬ 
ing a note-book from his waistcoat pocket. 

With an oath Ames crashed his fist 
down on the desk. 

“No!” he cried, “never! It’s—it’s 
unspeakable, it’s unworthy of a Harvard 
man! And, Colton, I’m done with you 
from this moment,” he added, moving to¬ 
ward the door, “ done with you, I say! ” 

“Ah, but one minute,” returned Colton 
gently, stepping quickly between him and 
the door, “ you may be done with me, but 
I don’t think so. At any rate, I’m not 
done with you. Now listen, and be rea- 


15 ° Brown of Harvard 

sonable. This Thorne, I understand, is 
a semi-savage from the mountains of 
Tennessee. Fellows like that don’t handle 
men of your sort with gloves. In fact, 
they become quite violent at times. What 
do you suppose he would do to you if I 
should tell him what I know ? What 
would he do to his sister? What would 
your own sister think, and your 
mother ——” 

“ Oh, for God’s sake,” said Ames, sink¬ 
ing back into his seat, quite broken, and re¬ 
sorting to his old, habitual whine, “ don’t 
—don’t; for heaven’s sake, man, don’t!” 

Colton stood contemplating the abject 
creature with a feeling almost of pity. 

“ There,” he said, “ now you ’re show¬ 
ing your good sense. What is the loss of 
a boat race compared with the loss of—of 
everything else? You will do as I tell 
you, like a good fellow,—and everything 
will work out all right in the end,—won’t 
you, old man? ” 

And for answer, Ames, crushed, de¬ 
feated, humiliated, once more bowed his 
head in his hands, and sobbed like a child. 



CHAPTER XII 


THE STORY OF SKIMPOLE M C LEA 

4 l l\TOW, look here, fellows, hang it all,” 

* ^ exclaimed Thurston as, some half 
hour after he had been so unceremoni¬ 
ously swept from the presence of his be¬ 
loved one, he was again tumultuously 
deposited on the ground under the elm 
tree—“ you may think this is very funny, 
but, confound it all, there’s a limit to all 
things.” 

“ Oh, gee,” wheezed Tubby as he lay 
sprawling and breathless on the grass— 
“ you were the limit, at that.” 

“ No, honest,” protested Thurston in¬ 
dignantly, “ if you consider this a 
joke- 

u We do, we do,” exclaimed Van Rens¬ 
selaer gleefully, “ it was a bully joke. I 
wonder you don’t appreciate it, old man.” 



152 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Well, I don’t see anything funny in 
it,” continued Thurston angrily; “mak¬ 
ing me look like a two-spot right before 
Miss Ames. It was a low down trick. If 
Tom can’t get next any other way than 
by mobbing a chap, then he ought to quit 
and leave the field for those who play 
fair.” 

“ Well, at least,” observed Jean seri¬ 
ously, “ we gave you a nice half hour’s 
spin in his benzine buggy. Just think of 
that. You ought to go and thank him, 
first chance you get.” 

“All right,” replied Thurston, who was 
still very obviously suffering from a sense 
of wounded dignity—what the novel writ¬ 
ers would term “ amour propre ”—“ I ’ll 
get even with you yet.” And as he moved 
off down the walk he stopped long enough 
to deliver this awful, parting shot: 

“ You ’re all a bunch of—of damned 
Indians! ” 

So far, however, from being seriously 
disturbed by this dire anathema, Jean de 
Reszke was distinctly cheerful, and at 
once, in his really beautiful tenor voice, 


Story of Skimpole McLea 153 

started a song, the others, seated on the 
bench, on the steps, on the grass under the 
trees, joining in a vociferous chorus: 

If I were a duck 
And you were a duck, 

And we were all ducks together, 

We M paddle in a boat in a rubber overcoat, 
In rainy or other weather. 

(Chorus:) Quack! Quack! Quackety—quack 
quack, 

Ftz! Boom! How’s your mamma now? 

If I were a cat 
And you were a cat, 

And we were all cats together, 

We’d stroll on the fence, where the shubbery 
is dense, 

In rainy or other weather. 

(Chorus:) Meow, meow, wow-wow-wow, 

Ftz! Boom! How’s your mamma now? 

If I were a girl 
And you were a girl, 

And we were all girls together. 

We’d spoon ’neath the moon, in the merry 
month of June, 

In rainy or other weather. 

(Chorus :) *-,-,-,-,-. 

Ftz! Boom! How’s your mamma now? 

* These dashes represent the sound made by audible 
osculation. The authors were unable to devise any 
typographical equivalent. 







i54 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Say, fellows,” exclaimed Jean when 
this highly classical selection had been 
punctiliously brought to a close, “ it’s 
getting damp out here. Come on up in 
my room and I ’ll tell you the queerest 
story about my grind.” 

The others followed Jean into the 
dormitory, and went up to his room on the 
second floor, the windows of which over¬ 
looked the yard they had just left. Jean 
perched himself comfortably on the win¬ 
dow-seat, while the men strewed them¬ 
selves about the place, some in chairs, some 
on the couch, others on rugs, the sole 
object being to obtain a comfortable 
position with the expenditure of the least 
possible energy. 

“ I suppose you fellows knew I had a 
grind, didn’t you?” began Jean looking 
around upon his guests. 

“Well, I don’t know about that, 
Jean,” replied Tubby, cheerfully. “We 
knew you ought to have one, at any 
rate.” 

“ Oh, so little Bright Eyes has come to, 
has he,” said Jean sarcastically, with a 


Story of* Skimpole McLea 155 

vain endeavor to squelch the irrepressible 
Tubby with a scowl. 

“ Sure thing/’ responded Tubby 
promptly. 

“Well,” continued Jean, “I have got 
a grind, and he’s the queerest chap you 
ever saw. He is tall and skinny—fear¬ 
fully skinny—you can almost see through 
him—and his name is Skimpole McLea. 
Of course,” he added parenthetically, 
partly by way of apology and partly by 
way of explanation, “ we just had to call 
him ‘ Skimpy.’ You know, the name fits 
him to a T. 

“ He is a very modest sort of chap, 
seemed to be awfully poor, and needed 
the money, and he is a crackajack tutor, 
too. I had him for Geology 2, for there 
are a few things that I sort of failed to 
assimilate pertaining to the paleozoic age.” 

There was a grunt of sympathy from 
Jean’s audience. 

“ Things ran along slick as mud until 
one day while I was here alone somebody 
knocked at the door, and a real pretty girl 
came into the room.” 


156 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Look here, Jean,” broke in his chum 
Bernard incredulously, “ is this another 
Tom Brown game? There seems to be 
an epidemic of fair queens butting into the 
retired apartments of bashful college 
students.” 

“ Oh, dry up, Berny! ” cried Tubby im¬ 
patiently. “ Remember, Jean is a musi¬ 
cal artist, and enjoys certain immunities. 
Go ahead with your spiel, Jean.” 

“ 4 This is Mr. Bernard’s and Mr. 
Pierce’s room, is n’t it? ’ she asked, very 
sweet and lovely, 4 and you are Mr. Pierce 
—Jean de Reszke! You see, I know you 
from the description my brother gave us 
of you.’ 

“ She had me groggy at the start,” said 
Jean, 44 but I asked her to sit down, not 
exactly knowing what she had to say. 
You see, I thought of course it was a 
4 touch ’ of some kind, but—well, she was 
deucedly pretty, so, as I said, I asked her 
to sit down.” 

44 Yes, you said that,” observed the in¬ 
defatigable Tubby. 44 Hurry on to the 
part where I come in. I was in it, boys,” 


Story of Skimpole McLea 157 

he explained, turning to the group on 
the floor. 

“ ‘ I was looking for my brother —Mr. 
Bernard’s and your chum, you know,’ she 
said,” continued Jean. “ Of course I 
did n’t know who on earth she meant, but 
I looked wise, and she went on. 

“ ‘ My mother and I came up to visit 
him. We went to his room, but as he 
was n’t there, I thought of course he must 
be here, with his dearest friends.’ 

“ I was up against it for fair then,” 
said Jean; “couldn’t imagine who the 
devil the brother was, for I thought I 
knew all the sisters in our crowd. Any¬ 
how, she took a seat, real home-like and 
cosey, and began to size me up as if I had 
been an exhibit in the museum. 

“ ‘ I should have known you anywhere 
from my brother’s description,’ she said. 

‘ I can see at once why the fellows call you 
“ Lord a’mighty Pierce ” sometimes, 
though brother says you are not nearly 
so snobbish as you look.’ ” 

There was another appreciative gurgle 
from those on the floor. 


158 Brown of Harvard 

“ I thanked her kindly,” said Jean, 
“ and begged her to proceed. 

44 4 He says you have been awfully kind 
to him,’ she said, 4 and that since you got 
him so much tutoring to do he has been 
able to afford better lodgings and has 
picked up wonderfully in health.’ 

44 Well, sir,” explained Jean, 44 she had 
me going then sure. I racked my brains 
but could n’t for the life of me think of any 
of our crowd who was making a specialty 
of tutoring. It seemed to me that the 
boot was on the other leg. However, she 
did n’t appear to notice, but went right 
on, kind of sizing up the room and then 
looking over at me in a way that made me 
feel kind of—of queer.” 

44 Say, cut that all out, will you Jean,” 
interrupted Tubby. 44 Get a move on 
you and arrive at the part where I come 
in.” 

44 4 Mother thought it was going to make 
brother miserable,’ ” Jean continued, 
paying Tubby no heed, 44 4 coaching a lot 
of rich students. She wrote him not to 
do it if it made him unhappy; and then 


Story of Skimpole McLea 159 

suddenly after that his letters grew bright 
and cheerful, and he told us how fond you 
had all grown of him, and how you had 
taken him up. He is devoted to Mr. 
Bernard and the others, but I think he 
likes you best of all.’ ” 

Tubby looked up at the speaker 
quizzically. 

“ Sure,” he said with delicate irony, 
“why not? Jean de Reszke, member of 
the glee club, entertainer of strange but 
beautiful young ladies, and all round 
Good Samaritan.” 

“ Well,” replied Jean, in some confu¬ 
sion, “ I ’ll admit I felt sort of queer— 
asked her what the deuce I had ever done 
to make this unknown chum so fond of 
me, and then, sir, she got up and reeled 
off a speech just like the leading lady in 
a repertoire company. 

“ 4 Yes, he’s just devoted to you! ’ she 
says, very dramatic. 4 Now, don’t you 
pretend that you have forgotten that time 
when you stood up before all the other 
fellows and said: 44 Men, here is a chap 
who is poor but brilliant. He has been 


i6o 


Brown of Harvard 


unnoticed, insulted, sorrowful, and alone. 
After this, he is our friend, one of us! ” 
Ah, I learned that speech by heart/ she 
says. ‘ It was so noble of you. Brother 
told us all about it in his letters/ ” 

“ Say, Jean/’ inquired Tubby with 
some curiosity, “ did you ever make a 
spiel like that? ” 

“ Not when I Ve been sober, and you 
fellows know that booze is n’t my long 
suit.” 

u ‘We used to cry, my mother and 1/ 
she went on, ‘ when brother first came to 
Harvard. His letters were so sad. You 
see, the McLeas are an old family with 
generations of Scotch pride back of them, 
so I suppose that is what made him suf¬ 
fer so at first.’ 

“Well, sir,” said Jean solemnly, “you 
could have knocked me over with a 
feather duster. McLea! Skimpole Mc- 
Lea! Skimpy McLea! Why—you see, 
this unknown chum of ours was no other 
than my grind! ” 

“ Gee whiz, Jean,” exclaimed Bernard 
sitting up in his place on the rug, “ this 


Story of Skimpole McLea 161 


is real melodrama—great! Go on. What 
did the fair young queen spring on you 
next? ” 

“ Jean,” interposed Tubby mourn¬ 
fully, “ will you please skip to the part 
where I make my entrance, left upper 
center? ” 

“ Well,” continued Jean, whose man¬ 
ner as he went on with his narrative be¬ 
came increasingly serious, “ she got up, 
crossed the room, and stood in front of 
the fireplace, sort of admiring things 
generally. 

“ ‘ O dear! ’ she said, 4 1 never thought 
I should get to see this room! You see, 
it was like this. We have an uncle—quite 
rich, but very canny. How it happened, 
I cannot say, but last week something put 
it into his head to send us a little money. 
Mother was for giving it to Skimpole, but 
I thought, as long as he was doing so well, 
it would be better to come on and visit him 
instead. We had n’t seen the dear boy 
for nearly a year, so mother adopted my 
advice, and here we are! ’ 

“ Just as she said that,” continued 


162 


Brown of Harvard 


Jean, “ there was a devil of a clatter out 
in the hallway, and I knew the gang was 
coming in. I was rattled all right, but 
determined to put on a bold front and let 
that girl down as easy as possible.” 

“Bully for you!” exclaimed Tubby 
ecstatically, “ always let the ladies down 
easy. But please hurry to where I-” 

“ Well,” went on Jean, whose manner 
had by this time become strangely solemn, 
“ when the door opened, in pranced Tom 
Brown, and Madden, and Van. At first, 
not noticing the girl, they were for making 
a rough-house, but as soon as they saw her, 
standing nice and gentle over near the 
fireplace, they simmered down good and 
plenty. For a while I was stumped, 
everything seemed so—so queer. But 
finally, I began introducing them all 
around. And, sir, the funniest thing 
was, that she seemed to know all about 
them beforehand. I was a little rattled 
but wound up by saying, 4 This is Skim- 
pole McLea’s sister;—our chum, you 
know.’ 

“ The fellows were n’t 4 on ’ right away, 



Story of Skimpole McLea 163 


so I had to come back at them again— 
said it all over once more, and then the 
girl, in order to help out, said, kind of 
anxious: 

Yes, Skimpy—Skimpy McLea’s sis¬ 
ter—your chum s sister.’ 

44 1 never saw such a slow bunch in my 
life,” said Jean disgustedly. 44 1 thought 
they would never wake up, but finally Tom 
Brown—you would never have suspected 
it of him, of course,—suddenly had a lucid 
interval, and sang out: 

44 4 Skimpy! Oh, yes! dear old Skimp! 
Why, he’s the finest, noblest, j oiliest fel¬ 
low in college! ’ 

44 With that,” said Jean, 44 he went up 
to the girl, seized her by both hands and 
let on as if she were his long lost mother 
—he was that glad to see her. Oh! there’s 
nothing mean about Tom when once he 
catches on. It worked good with the 
girl, too. She warmed up to Tom like 
a kitten to a hot brick, and began to tell 
him what a fine chap he was, and how her 
brother had written such glowing ac¬ 
counts of him,—when all of a sudden there 


164 


Brown of Harvard 


was a sound on the steps like a cow learn¬ 
ing to waltz, and then she said: 

“ 4 Oh, that must be Mr. Anderson. 
Dear Mr. Anderson— 44 Tubby,” Skimpy 
calls him. He must be so funny! 

44 Say fellows,” observed Tubby, with 
a perfectly serious countenance, 44 this is 
where I come in. Oh, I made good, all 
right, all right.” 

44 The door opened and Tubby stood 
grinning on the threshold,” continued 
Jean, 44 looking as if he had just escaped 
from the asylum. Of course I knew he 
was liable to make some awful break, so 
I went up to him to tip him off: 

44 4 Tubby,’ I said, 4 this is Miss McLea, 
—Skimpy’s sister—you know; don’t you 
catch on? ’ ” 

“And do you know what that idiot 
said! ” inquired Jean mournfully, looking 
about the room. 

The fellows gazed up at him curiously. 

44 He said,” continued Jean, his at¬ 
titude betokening the most intense 
disgust: 

44 4 Give it up. What’s the answer? ’ ” 


Story of Skimpole McLea 165 

Whereupon Tubby, wholly unmoved 
by this report of his dereliction, sank back 
on the floor with a sigh of sweet content. 

“ Sure thing,” he said, “ what else 
could I do? He had me up against a 
stiff proposition and I did n’t know what 
to say.” 

“ Well,” went on Jean, “ I grabbed 
Tubby by the coat and told him that this 
was Miss McLea—Skimpy’s sister—and 
the lobster blurted out again: 

“ ‘ But who the deuce is Skimpy Mc¬ 
Lea? ’ Oh,” added Jean, shaking his fist 
at the fat figure of his friend as he lay 
comfortably on the rug, “ I could have 
knocked his block off! ” 

“ The poor girl, Miss McLea, was ter¬ 
ribly upset—seemed ready to sink through 
the floor; and of course the only thing for 
me to do was to tell her that Tubby was 
shy a few in the upper story, and explain 
to her in a few well-chosen words that 
he was a damned fool.” 

Tubby beamed pleasantly while Jean 
continued: 

“ Miss McLea, as I said, was terribly 


166 


Brown of Harvard 


upset. She got awfully pale and began 
to carry on like all hysterics, saying that 
she might have known when she had been 
to her brother’s poor lodgings and then 
come to these, that we were not his friends. 
And then she began to cry—yes, hang it 
all, to cry about her poor brother, how 
she had humiliated him, and all that rot— 
and then suddenly she flashed around on 
me, her eyes fairly spitting fire, and said: 

“ ‘ How dared you? Why did you not 
tell me? It was a cruel, cruel joke! ’ 

“ Well, of course I was all in, but just 
at that moment the door opened, and a 
little bit of a faded woman, but with a 
very sweet, refined way about her, came 
into the room. 

“ ‘ Why, Jeanne/ she said to the girl, 
‘you stayed so long! Your brother has 
not yet returned, so I came here thinking 
that you had found him/ 

“ Then she sized us fellows up, and be¬ 
gan to look kind of queer about the gills, 
evidently suspecting something was n’t 
quite according to Hoyle. 

What is it? ’ she said, after she had 


Story of Skimpole McLea 167 

looked over each one of us in a searching 
kind of way, 4 has anything happened to 
my son? ’ 

“ She seemed so weak and faint that— 
darn it all, fellows—I just had to hustle 
over and put her to the good. After I 
got her in a seat, I said: 

“‘Happened to him! Well I should 
say not! He’s all right. You should 
have let him know you were coming. You 
see he has so many engagements, he—be¬ 
ing so popular,—does n’t get home till 
late.’ 

“And then I insisted that she should 
make tea for us—oh, I was in it good and 
plenty, but I was bound to see it through. 
I told her how fine it would be to have 
Skimpy’s mother and sister make tea for 
us. And then I introduced the other fel¬ 
lows, Tom and Madden and Van, as 
Skimpy’s dearest friends, and ”—here for 
some strange reason Jean’s usually clear 
and distinct voice became somewhat 
choked, and his narrative began to lose 
some of its accustomed assurance—“ and 
then she said to me; 


i68 


Brown of Harvard 


44 4 Oh,—you are Mr. Pierce—Skimpy’s 
best friend,’—and then she went on with 
a lot of hot air about how noble I had 
been to her darling son, about his being 
a poor man among all these rich students, 
and all that kind of rot. The girl tried 
to butt in and head her off,—she seemed 
awfully embarrassed—sort of caught on 
to the game, I suppose, but the old lady 
kept right on. 

“ 4 Tell me,’ she says, 4 how my dear boy 
looks? I can’t believe he is so happy, 
so prosperous, until I see him with my 
own eyes. To think of his becoming such 
an athlete, too! ’ ” 

44 Oh, that was a corker,” interpolated 
Tubby— 44 Skimpy an athlete!—Wow! 
Next thing you know, they will have me 
on the crew as coxswain.” 

44 And,” continued Jean, 44 she spoke 
about how the fellows cheered him when 
he made a touch-down in the Dartmouth 
game. Gee! She had me up a stump 
then. Imagine that skinny grind mak¬ 
ing the team! But that was n’t all. She 
went on to tell about the banquet we gave 


Story of Skimpole McLea 169 

in his honor, and about the beautiful 
verses he read. The daughter tried to 
butt in again, but the old lady was mov¬ 
ing free and easy and there was no stop¬ 
ping her. 

“ 4 1 must speak my heart out,’ she says, 
4 these are all Skimpole’s friends, and they 
will understand. If they had not appre¬ 
ciated him and taken him up, where would 
he be now? Sad, sad and lonely/ ” con¬ 
tinued Jean, with all the relish of a pro¬ 
fessional raconteur . “ ‘ Ah, his first 
letters! How my heart bled/ she said.” 

The men were listening attentively 
now, and even the irrepressible Tubby 
looked solemn. “ 4 He wrote to me that 
he had n’t a friend, and that he was so 
lonely—so lonely for me and Jeanne. 
Harvard was only a place for rich men, 
he said. It almost broke my heart. And 
then, one day, I wrote to him that I had 
decided to sell our little home. We 
could have lived very comfortably in 
lodgings until Skimpole became a lawyer 
and acquired a practice. I had a very 
good offer for the house, which would have 


170 


Brown of Harvard 


enabled me to send him more money. I 
wrote him of it. That night there came a 
telegram. It said: “Don’t sell. Great 
news.” Then came his letter telling us 
how the very best set of men in the Uni¬ 
versity had taken him up; how good you 
all were to him, getting him all those 
pupils; taking a poor man in as one of 
you.’ ” 

Here Jean paused and looked about 
upon his auditors, as if anticipating some 
interruption to his narrative. The men 
remained, however, quite still. 

“ Well,” continued Jean after a mo¬ 
ment of tense silence, “ she went right on 
like this: ‘We cried for joy that night, 
and after that we called you “ our boys.” 
Every letter of Skimpole’s told us of some 
new, noble deed on your part.’ ” 

“ Gee,” cried Tubby, “ are n’t you lay¬ 
ing it on pretty thick? ” 

“Ah, cut it,” exclaimed Bernard per¬ 
emptorily, “ let Jean go on with his 
spiel.” 

“And then she said,” continued Jean, 
‘ I love you all! you are all in my pray- 


Story of Skimpole McLea 171 

ers, all of you. I ask Heaven to be as 
good to you as you have been to my 
son.’ ” 

Jean stopped, and an embarrassed si¬ 
lence followed. It was not exactly the 
kind of story that college men tell, yet 
they all felt that it was real, and that they 
were more or less intimately concerned 
with the recital. For a minute the room 
remained wrapped in utter quiet. 

“ Well,” continued Jean, “ after a 
while there came a knock at the door, and 
—who do you suppose stood there on the 
threshold? ” 

“ It was Skimpy,” announced Tubby 
with an effect that was wholly anti¬ 
climacteric. 

“Yes,” said Jean; “he stood there for 
a minute kind of dazed, and the rest of us 
were dazed too, at that. At last, fearing 
that Tubby might make one of his con¬ 
founded breaks and put the old lady wise, 
I rushed over to him and grabbed him by 
the hand and pulled him into the room. 

“ ‘ Hello! ’ I said, 4 where in the devil 
have you been all the afternoon? You 


17 $ Brown of Harvard 

see, we’ve had to welcome your mother 
and sister for you, Skimpy, old man.’ 
And then I gave him a hell of a clip on the 
shoulder so as to sort of bring him to a 
bit, for he still seemed to be about four 
miles up in the air—looked as if he had 
lost his last friend, instead of finding a 
whole bunch of them all on a sudden. 

“ Well, it was a darned awkward posi¬ 
tion, any way you look at it. I could n’t 
help feeling sorry for Jeanne—Miss Mc- 
Lea—who, of course, was 4 on,’ and 
seemed dreadfully mortified. However, 
the old lady rushed over to him and 
hugged him fine and dandy, and Tom and 
Madden and Van did their duty nobly 
too. They grabbed him by the hand, 
sang out 4 Skimpy, old man, glad to see 
you back,—where the deuce have you 
been?’ and things like that, until finally 
the chap appeared to feel a little bit at 
ease. And then Tubby, for a wonder, 
came to the centre like a little man and 
says-” 

44 Ah, cut that out, Jean,” interrupted 
Tubby with an unwonted diffidence. 



Story of Skimpole McLea 173 

“ Shut up, Tubby,” said Bernard. 
“ What did he do, Jean? ” 

“ Why he waltzed up to his Skimplets, 
and, putting both hands on his shoulders, 
said: 

Look here, Skimpy, old man, I don’t 
think it’s fair your devoting all your at¬ 
tention to these other guys when I stand 
to be flunked all down the line. Now, I 
want a little coaching in Geology 2, and 
in—in, well, in a little of everything if 
you’ve got the time.’ ” 

“ Good for you, Tubby,” exclaimed 
Bernard enthusiastically, “for once in 
your life you did the right thing.” 

“Well,” responded Tubby sheepishly, 
“ I guess I needed the coaching, did n’t 
I? ” 

“What happened next?” asked 
Bernard. 

“ Oh, we had a regular heart-to-heart 
tea-fest,—Mrs. McLea sitting over there 
in the easy chair, her eyes glued on 
Skimpy, proud as a queen, while the 
girl- 


Oh, yes,” broke in Tubby, “ while the 



174 


Brown of Harvard 


girl and you sneaked off into a corner and 
fussed to beat the band. By the way, Jean, 
was n’t Miss McLea the girl you gave all 
your favors to at the last german? ” 

“ Oh, you dry up, Tub,” exclaimed 
Jean, flushing a brilliant red, “ I guess 
that’s my own business. 

“ Well,” he went on, “ we finally set¬ 
tled down into a nice, sociable family 
party, everything running as smooth as 
grease, when the door burst open, and 
there stood Happy Thurston. He was n’t 
4 wise,’ and nobody had time to put him 
4 on,’ when he saw the old lady calmly 
sipping her tea, and Skimpy seated on the 
arm of her chair, and—and me and Jea— 
Miss McLea having conversation, so of 
course he had to blurt out: 

44 4 Hello! what’s up? ’ 

44 There was only one thing for me to 
answer,” said Jean. 

What should be up? ’ I said, serene 
and peaceful, trying to give him the wink, 
4 but that we are giving a little reception 
and tea to the mother and sister of our 
most intimate friend, Skimpole McLea!’ 


Story of Skimpole McLea 175 

“ Happy’s eyes bulged for a moment, 
but he was game,—and, well—he stood 
for it. In fact, he came over and seized 
the little old lady by both hands, telling 
her about the unexpected pleasure, and 
all that sort of thing, and then he slapped 
Skimpy on the back so that he coughed 

up a mouthful of tea—and then-” 

“And then,” interposed the ever alert 
Tubby, “ he butted right in to join your 
little spoon seance, and proceeded to make 
himself solid with that awfully pretty sis¬ 
ter. Oh, Happy’s a winner, all right.” 

“Hush, fellows!” cried Jean from his 
perch on the window-seat as he chanced to 
glance down into the yard, “ here comes 
the stroke oar. Look yonder! ” 

There was a scramble and rush toward 
the window, and a craning of necks and 
an indiscriminate waving of legs, as the 
men strove desperately to catch a glimpse 
of the new phenomenon. 



CHAPTER XIII 


MARIAN THORNE 

HAT the men saw was Marian and 



* V her stalwart brother Gerald 
standing under the shade of the elm tree. 
Thorne held his sister’s hand in his own, 
caressingly, yet in a way reprovingly, 
and he spoke in a low, distinct tone, so 
that every word was conveyed to the band 
of ingenuous listeners in Warren Pierce’s 
study. 

“ Marian,” Thorne said, in his custom¬ 
ary solemn voice, “ I was surprised—dis¬ 
appointed to see you bow to that fellow 
Brown a while ago. Of all men in the 
University! How do you happen to know 
him? Don’t you understand,” he added 
bitterly, “ that I detest him as a purse- 
proud, overbearing snob? ” 

41 ‘ I met him at a tea one of the girls 


Marian Thorne 177 

gave,” replied Marian timidly. “ He 
seems very—very nice.” 

Thorne dropped her hand and strode 
impatiently up and down, occasionally 
stopping and glancing at his sister with a 
look of bitter reproach. 

“ I don’t like any of that fast set,” he 
said at last sternly. “A poor girl, such 
as you are, is much better without ac¬ 
quaintances of that kind. Nothing but 
harm can come from this sort of thing. 
Understand, Marian, dear, it is my ear¬ 
nest wish that you shall not speak to him 
again—remember, not even speak to him. 
I dislike Brown above any of them—ex¬ 
cept that conceited ass Madden. They 
despise us because we are poor. Well! 
Let them! I would rather be poor than 
—than ” 

“ Oh,” interrupted the girl anxiously, 
—I don’t think they feel that way, 
Gerald.” 

“ Oh, yes, they do,” he replied brusquely, 
“ they ’re all rotten with the pride of in¬ 
herited money and—vices. You don’t 
know what a miserable set they are. 



i 7 8 


Brown of Harvard 


They have n’t any use for the man who 
has n’t got the price.” 

“ Oh, brother,” pleaded Marian ear¬ 
nestly, laying a protesting hand on 
his shoulder, “don’t say that; why, who 
knows but what it may be one of that set 
who is—is helping you through college? ” 

An ugly frown settled on Thorne’s 
none too peaceful face. 

“ If I thought that,” he replied sav¬ 
agely, putting her away from him 
roughly, “if I thought that—if I even 
dreamt of such a thing, why—I—I. 
But ”—here he laughed bitterly, incred¬ 
ulously—“ but, dear, you don’t know 
them. Help me through college? Why, 
they are selfish to the core. They 
scarcely know I’m in existence. I tell 
you, I don’t belong to their set, nor they 
to mine, thank God! And, Marian, while 
we are talking of these things—why do I 
find you walking about the yard when I 
expressly told you to be extremely careful 
not to put yourself in the way of these 
rich loafers? ” 

“ Oh, but Gerald, dear,” replied the 


Marian Thorne 


i79 


girl, with the slightest tinge of resentment 
in her voice, “ I was n’t—was n’t walking 
about the yard. I was merely doing what 
all the other girls do on Thursdays. It 
is quite customary. I was just going to 
Vespers, you know, and I did n’t think 
you would mind my coming this way.” 

“ Well,” said Thorne gruffly, seem¬ 
ingly bent on finding fault, “ I don’t like 
your coming through this part of the 
grounds. There is no telling what hu¬ 
miliation you might be put to. Don’t do 
it any more.” 

He started to enter the dormitory. 

“ Wait here a moment, dear, I wish to 
see Cartright. I ’ll come back and take 
you home shortly.” 

But as he turned and saw her forlorn 
figure on the bench, his mood suddenly 
relented. Stepping quickly to her side 
he knelt down and lifted her face in his 
hands and looked into it affectionately, 
yearningly. 

“ Poor little motherless girl,” he said in 
a broken voice, his huge, awkward frame 
shaking with emotion; “I’m sometimes 


i8o 


Brown of Harvard 


harsh with you—unreasonable with you. 
But,” he added, as he drew her to him in a 
rough embrace, while his words became 
almost unintelligible, “ but you know, 
Marian, it’s all because you ’re so dear to 
me. I would n’t have anything happen 
to you for the world.” 

She trembled in his arms, and her head 
drooped upon his shoulder. 

“ You know it’s all because I love you 
so,” he added hoarsely, “ you know that, 
don’t you, dear? ” 

“ Yes—yes, Gerald,” she sobbed. “ I 
know, you are—too good to me, too good 
to me.” 

Thorne gently disengaged himself 
from her, and after patting her lovingly 
on the back, with that sense of embarrass¬ 
ment that all men feel in the presence of 
women’s tears, he made his way into the 
dormitory. 

The brief twilight of the early spring 
evening was rapidly dwindling away, and 
it was growing dark. As Marian sank 
back on the bench, her head bowed in her 
hands, lights began to appear in the win- 


Marian Thorne 


1 8 1 

dows of the neighboring buildings, throw¬ 
ing into occasional relief the silhouette of 
a student lounging in an easy chair, or 
walking idly to and fro before a lamp. 
In Pierce’s room, however, which directly 
overlooked the spot where the girl was sit¬ 
ting, the men had become strangely silent, 
except, of course, for the unfailing Tubby. 

“Gee!” he whispered to the others, 
who still remained on the window-seat, 
gazing intently into the gloom, “ I would 
hate to have that chap Thorne get real 
mad at me. It’s lucky he was n’t around 
that day when Tom had that seance 
with-” 

“Hush, will you, you darned idiot!” 
exclaimed Jean; and then, quite irrele¬ 
vantly, he began to pipe up in his sweet, 
pure tenor voice, to the humming accom¬ 
paniment of the others: 

Last night a nightingale woke me. 

At the sound of the singing, Marian 
started timidly to rise from her seat, but 
just as she did so Wilton Ames made his 
appearance around the corner of the 
building. 



182 


Brown of Harvard 


“Marian!” he cried, catching sight of 
the figure on the bench. 

“Hush!” cried the girl, looking ner¬ 
vously up at the window, and retreating 
to the other side of the tree. 

“ But, Marian! I ’ve been looking for 
you everywhere. Why were n’t you at 
the gate? ” 

“ Oh, Wilton! ” cried the girl in great 
agitation, still glancing up at the window, 
whence the sound of the singing was 
wafted down like a gentle benediction, 
“ I met Gerald—you must go away— 
go away quickly—he’s in there. He 
must n’t see me talking with you. 
Please, please go away! ” 

“ But I must see you. I’ve waited to 
see you for days.” 

In an instant the whole manner of the 
girl changed. 

“ Oh, have you, dear? ” she asked joy¬ 
fully. “ Have you really, Wilton? I— 
I thought you did n’t care.” 

“ Care! ” he replied, grasping her 
firmly by both hands, and gazing down at 
her intently; “ why, Marian, I think of 


Marian Thorne 183 

nothing else. I love you, oh, I love you! ” 
he cried as he gripped her hands ruth¬ 
lessly. “ Why, listen, dearest. I ’ve 
kept away from drink for two weeks— 
just for your sake. I’ve been studying 
hard too. And this summer I’m going 
to try to get some work, so that I can take 
care of you! ” 

“Oh, Wilton, are you really?” cried 
the girl looking up at him ecstatically 
through a film of tears; “do you mean 
you are going to—to marry-” 

Ames suddenly relaxed his grasp of the 
girl’s hands, and there was a return to 
the old, accustomed weakness of his 
manner. 

“ Why,” he said, turning from her awk¬ 
wardly, “ I thought we understood that, 
Marian. You know, I am wholly de¬ 
pendent upon my mother. Besides, they, 
—mother and Evelyn—don’t know you,” 
he added sinking miserably on the bench, 
“ and we are—so—so unfortunate.” 

With all her noble nature and womanly 
unselfishness, she moved quickly to his 
side, and spoke to him soothingly, as a 



Brown of Harvard 


184 

mother would speak to a spoiled child suf¬ 
fering from an imagined injury. 

“ There, there, dear,” she said, “ I know 
you are right, of course you are quite 
right! Don’t be impatient with me. 
Don’t worry, dear. Everything will be 
all—all right.” 

“Worry!” he exclaimed petulantly, 
“ oh, that’s what drives me wild. I don’t 
do anything else but worry. It’s enough 
to drive a man to desperation,” he 
added with colossal selfishness. “ The 
fellows think I’m weak,—dissipated. 
They don’t know how I am tortured! ” 

“ Oh, Wilton,” cried the girl beseech¬ 
ingly, but in a voice so low that it could 
not be heard by those at the window, 
“ promise me, dearest, that you won’t 
drink again. I could n’t bear to think 
that you should harm yourself because 
of me! Don’t worry about me, dear,” 
she continued, as she buried her head 
on his knee, “ don’t worry about me. 
We shall both be happy,—very, very 
happy.” 

Ames drew himself up suddenly, a 


Marian Thorne 185 

spark of his native manhood coming to 
his aid in this miserable crisis. 

“ Marian! ” he cried, lifting her to her 
feet and, with a desperate effort, assum¬ 
ing a tone of authority. “ I’m going to 
do the right thing. Understand always, 
no matter what happens, that I love you 
sincerely, only I’m so wretchedly poor 
and dependent.” Reaching into his coat 
pocket he took out a slip of paper. 
“ Here—take this, you may need it.” 

Marian held the piece of paper in the 
meagre light of a neighboring lamp, and 
then drew back, aghast, looking at Ames 
in horror. 

“A check!” she exclaimed. “Money? 
—you offer me money? ” 

“ Don’t be foolish, Marian,” replied 
Ames in very manifest confusion and 
averting his eyes from her intent gaze. 
“ It is merely to be used in case of an 
emergency. You know you may—you 

may want to leave some day, and-” 

“ Oh, but Wilton, Wilton! ” pleaded 
the girl in a heart-broken tone, “ you 
surely would n’t wish to—oh, Wilton, 



186 Brown of Harvard 

dear. It says, ‘ Tom Brown, for three 
hundred dollars!’ Oh, Wilton, dear, 
what am I to think? ” 

“ Hush! ” he replied sternly. “ Brown 
lent it to me. I tell you it’s all right. 
Don’t!” he cried, as Marian tried to 
thrust the check back into his pocket. 
“ Keep it, if you have any regard for my 
happiness. You can get it cashed any¬ 
where. You need n’t use it unless it is 
absolutely necessary. Hush! Here are 
a bunch of the fellows,” he added, as the 
sound of talking and singing came from 
around the dormitory. 

“ When shall I see you again, Wil¬ 
ton? ” asked Marian wistfully. 

“ I don’t know,” he said hastily. “ I ’ll 
send you word. Good-bye. Don’t worry! ” 
Whereupon he kissed her lightly, and 
hurried off, while Marian, dazed and for¬ 
lorn, sank back limply on the bench. 

“ Say, fellows,” cried the observant 
Tubby, who, despite the singing, had kept 
a keen eye on what was going forward, 
“ he ’s kissed her! Gee, did n’t you hear 
it? And he gave her something, too! ” 


CHAPTER XIV 


tom’s probation ended 

QCARCELY had Marian dropped 
^ back helplessly on the bench which 
was now hidden by the deep shadow 
of the tree trunk, when a crowd of men 
headed by Madden made their appear¬ 
ance around the corner and stopped be¬ 
fore the dormitory. Perceiving the dim 
outline of figures in Jean de Reszke’s win¬ 
dow, they proceeded, as if by well-re¬ 
hearsed agreement, to address them after 
the manner of operatic recitative, several 
of the fellows undertaking the role of or¬ 
chestral instruments, especially of the 
bass viol, indicated by an occasional 
hoarse “Zim! Zim!” 

“ Jean de Reszke, Jean de Reszke, are 
you there? ” (“ Zim! Zim! ”) 


188 


Brown of Harvard 


Whereupon Jean, in his clarion voice, 
responded antiphonally: 

“Aye, ’t is true, ’t is very true, I am 
here! ” 

(“Zim! Zim!” from the industrious 
orchestra below.) 

At this point Madden assumed the 
burden of the song. 

“Are you alone,” he chanted in excel¬ 
lent imitation of the Wagnerian style, 
“ or are you solitary? ” 

“ I am alone,” warbled Jean to an im¬ 
provised air, entering blithely into the 
spirit of the performance, “ except, alas, 
for those who are with me! ” 

(“ Zim! Zim! ” again came from the bass 
viols, who, being largely composed of 
upper classmen, felt that they were priv¬ 
ileged to comport themselves with the 
dignity due the occasion.) 

“ ’T is well,” declaimed Madden, strik¬ 
ing a high key in a very dramatic manner. 
“ Then we will ascend, ascend,—and have 
a little practice with thee.” 

“Ascend, thou lobsterinos,” retorted 
Jean promptly, resorting to the Italian 


Tom’s Probation Ended 189 


method of delivery. And, while he 
launched forthwith into an air from Doni¬ 
zetti, the others marched solemnly through 
the doorway, emitting a more or less 
straggly “Amen,” in feeble imitation of 
the church service. 

In a few moments a light shone brightly 
from Jean’s window, and the men, many 
of whom were members of the ’Varsity 
Glee Club, broke forth into a capital 
rendition of the old favorite “ Integer 
Vitae,” with a surety of tone, swing of 
rhythm, and purity of harmony which al¬ 
most invariably characterize such im¬ 
promptu performances. 

In the meantime Marian had remained 
seated on the bench unnoticed and motion¬ 
less, but when the words of the beautiful 
old glee were borne down to her through 
the open window by the rollicking band 
of students, she started and trembled vio¬ 
lently, as though stung to the quick. “ In¬ 
teger Vitae! ” They seemed such a cruel, 
pointed mockery—those inspired verses 
of the fine old Roman poet! Poor, tor¬ 
tured, helpless creature that she was, she 


Brown of Harvard 


190 

shrank still further back into the shade of 
the protecting elm. 

“ ‘ Don’t worry!’” she repeated bit¬ 
terly. “ He said ‘ Don’t worry ’! As if 
I could do anything but worry. Oh, Wil¬ 
ton, Wilton, what shall I do? I love you 
so, dearest; I love you so! But how can I 
help worry? Oh,” she added piteously, 
while the tears streamed down her cheeks, 
“ if there were only some one who would 
be friendly with me, somebody who could 
sympathize-” 

At this critical juncture the stocky, 
exuberant figure of Tom Brown appeared 
as if by magic under the light of the corner 
lamp. He was very evidently in high 
good humor, and was engaged in alter¬ 
nately whistling and hugging himself 
spasmodically for very joy. 

“ Oh, Evie,” he muttered, half aloud, 
half to himself, “ what a corker you are! 
I knew you could n’t stay real mad with 
your own Tom. The front parlor for me 
again every Sunday night,” he chortled 
ecstatically. “ The horse-hair sofa for 
little Tommy. Oh, gee, just to think 




Tom Brown 








































































* 













► 
















. i 




y, 

.? 









Tom’s Probation Ended 191 


I’m solid once more, and all this damn 
nonsense has blown over! Now, why 
could n’t that dear girl have seen things 
in their right light from the beginning? 
But it’s just like women. They ’re so 
darned unreasonable,—only Evelyn is 
such a sweet, delightfully unreasonable 
little creature. Hello! What’s this?” 

He stopped abruptly when he saw the 
forlorn figure huddled on the bench, and 
then stepped over to her curiously. 

“ Oh,” she cried apprehensively, recall¬ 
ing the parting injunction of her brother, 
“ Mr. Brown, you must go away. Indeed 
you must. It—it is n’t right for me to 
speak to you.” 

“ I—er—oh, is it you, Miss Thorne? 
Beg pardon,—it’s so dark, I could n’t 
make you out. I trust,” he added in some 
embarrassment, “ that you did n’t mind 
any little thing I may have been saying 
in my sleep. You know, I’m a sonnam- 
bulist—somnambulist—which the deuce is 
it, any way? ” he added in comic vexation. 
“ One book says somnambulist, and the 
other sonnambulist, so how is a poor devil 


192 Brown of Harvard 

to know? By the way, did you ever see 
the opera—Sembrich—in—night gown— 
candle—and all that sort of thing? ” 
Here Tom reached the end of his rope, 
and awaited desperately for assistance 
from Marian. 

Cheered by the irresistible good nature 
of his presence- 

“ Oh, Mr. Brown,” she exclaimed with 
feminine inconsistency, and apparently 
forgetting all about her brother’s prohi¬ 
bition, “ I have waited to see you for so 
long! I have wanted to—to apologize if 
I—if I brought you any—any unhappi¬ 
ness by being in your room that miserable 
day. Everything seemed so awkward,— 
and I was so confused that I left without 
saying a word.” 

“ No, did you though? ” returned Tom 
earnestly. “ The fact is, I was sort of 
rattled myself—thought I was dreaming, 
kind of a nightmare, you know.” And 
then he stepped over to her, his face sud¬ 
denly beaming with joy, and, making an 
elaborate bow, he removed the bunch of 
violets from the lapel of his coat, gazing 
at them with idiotic adoration. 



Tom’s Probation Ended 


193 


“ Miss Thorne,” he announced, with a 
lame assumption of solemnity, “ you see 
before you the happiest man in Cam¬ 
bridge to-night.” 

“ Oh, I am so glad,” said Marian im¬ 
pulsively. “ Then there w r ere no—no 
awkward consequences from that horrid 
afternoon? ” 

“Awkward? Consequences?” replied 
Tom gleefully. “ I tell you, my dear 
young lady, I’m solid again,—-that is,” 
he added hurriedly, “ I’m on probation, 
and you know that means I’m wholly 
forgiven. At least,” he said, with a 
tinge of anxiety in his voice, “ probation 
means forgiveness, don’t you think, Miss 
Thorne, especially when there is nothing 
to forgive? ” 

“ You don’t, then,” said Marian gently, 
“you don’t despise me, do you? You 
know—I-” 

“Despise you!” cried Tom warmly, 
and beaming down upon her with the hon¬ 
est glow of good fellowship, “ why, what 
ever put such a foolish notion into your 
head? Despise you? Why, I think you 
are a brick! ” 



T 94 


Brown of Harvard 


Upon which he held out both hands to 
her, and she, carried away by the exuber¬ 
ance of his spirits, clasped them warmly. 

“ Oh, thank you, Mr. Brown; you are 
so generous, so kind—thank you, thank 
you!” 

At this interesting stage of affairs the 
huge, awkward frame of Gerald Thorne 
appeared abruptly in the doorway of the 
dormitory. For a moment he stared at 
the two as if stunned. Then, recovering 
himself, he said, in a solemn, almost sepul¬ 
chral voice: 

“ Thank him, Marian? What do you 
mean? ” He took a few steps nearer and 
glowered on Tom with an expression of 
infinite scorn. “ Why should you thank 
Km, Marian? ” he repeated sternly. 

His sister cast upon him a glance full 
of fear. 

“ Oh I—I—it was nothing,” she re¬ 
plied almost gasping with terror, and 
vainly endeavoring to release her hands 
from the flagrant delict of Tom’s hearty 
grasp. 

“ It was nothing, eh? ” thundered Ger- 


Tom’s Probation Ended 195 


aid, approaching the two threateningly. 
“ What did I tell you only a few minutes 
ago? What were you thanking him for, 
I say? ” 

Tom, who up to this time had been 
wholly dumbfounded by the sudden ap¬ 
parition of the sinister Thorne and his 
upbraiding demeanor—so much so in fact 
that he unconsciously retained a tenacious 
grasp of Marian’s hands—now began to 
come to. 

“ Why,” he said cheerfully, “ my dear 
fellow, “ there is no occasion for all this 
tragedy. Your sister, Miss Thorne, was 
—was merely thanking me for these vio¬ 
lets that I was giving her,” he added, as 
he finally released his hold, but allowed 
the violets to remain in her hand. 

“ Oh, is that so,” replied Thorne with a 
sneer as he stepped up to them, livid with 
suppressed rage. “Well,” he cried, 
snatching the unfortunate bouquet from 
his sister’s grasp and hurling it on the 
ground in a highly dramatic fashion, “ al¬ 
low me to tell you that my sister can dis¬ 
pense with your attentions as well as with 


196 Brown of Harvard 

your violets.” And, putting Marian’s 
hand on his arm, he strode off majesti¬ 
cally by her side into the darkness. 

For several moments Tom looked after 
their retreating forms in utter bewilder¬ 
ment, and then leaned weakly up against 
the friendly elm for support. 

“ Well, I ’ll be jinged! ” he exclaimed fi¬ 
nally, in genuine amazement, “ would n’t 
that freeze-? ” 

But, alas, his troubles were not over yet. 
For, while he had been surreptitiously 
slipping the violets into Marian’s hand, 
two girlish figures, unnoticed by him and 
by Marian and Gerald, had loomed up 
under the murky shadow of the tree, and 
had remained standing there, silent wit¬ 
nesses of the brief but fatal colloquy with 
Thorne. And they had remained there, 
speechless and immovable, when Tom be¬ 
gan his dazed soliloquy. It is perhaps 
needless to say that the two figures were 
those of Edith and Evelyn, who were 
adopting this rather devious course on 
their return home from Vespers. 



Tom’s Probation Ended 197 


“ Evie! ” exclaimed Tom, when at last 
he had identified these new arrivals. 

But that young lady bent on him a 
glance of freezing significance, the full 
effect of which was, however, unfortu¬ 
nately dissipated in the gloom. 

“ Don’t you dare to speak to me! ” she 
cried. “ Don’t you dare even to ever 
look at me again.” And seizing the arm 
of her companion, who also appeared to 
be affected by a certain sense of vicarious 
injury, she swept proudly down the walk, 
in the wake of Marian and Thorne. 

“ Gee whiz! ” exclaimed Tom, dropping 
weakly on the bench, and staring down at 
the fateful, scattered violets. “ Gee whiz 
—not even on probation! ” 

And, as merciless Fate would have it, 
there were wafted down from the room 
where Jean de Reszke was holding forth 
with his friends, the words of the beauti¬ 
ful, clinging old refrain: 

“ Sweet violets, I plucked them and brought 
them to Thee!” 


CHAPTER XV 


COLTON, THE TRAITOR 

HE thirtieth of April turned out to be 



1 a magnificent spring day—abso¬ 
lutely cloudless, with very little wind, and 
enough spice of the dead winter in the air 
to put Coach Hall’s carefully trained 
proteges on edge and encourage them to 
break the record over the old 1% mile 
course from the Longwood Bridge down 
the river to the end of the Basin. 

At the ’Varsity Boat-house, three miles 
up the river, the crew and substitutes 
and coach, together with the devoted 
Tubby, had assembled long before the 
time appointed for the firing of the pistol. 

Although this was no Yale race—the 
aquatic event of the year in which, of 
course, Harvard is principally concerned, 

■—it must be admitted that there was a 


Colton, the Traitor 199 

considerable degree of nervousness and 
apprehension among the members of the 
crew, in spite of the fact, or perhaps 
because of the fact, that the odds were 
largely in their favor. The men had re¬ 
peatedly made excellent time in practice 
over the course, but, as is always the case 
when contending against an unknown 
crew, especially a crew from England 
where rowing is developed as the highest 
department of athletics, there was a very 
palpable element of uncertainty, and, to 
use the expressive, if somewhat trite, 
phrase of Mr. Bud Hall, they one and all 
realized the circumstance that they were 
“ up against it.” They might win with 
ease, and then again—they might be 
wholly outclassed. True, there had been 
plenty of opportunities to witness the 
Englishmen’s performances over the same 
course, but your seasoned boatman will 
be the last man in the world to lay any 
particular stress on such tests. Condi¬ 
tions of tide, and weather, and wind, and 
the dozens of other matters that must be 
taken into consideration in determining a 


200 


Brown of Harvard 


crew’s actual worth, vary so much from 
day to day,—ay, even from hour to hour, 
that comparative “ times ” are little to be 
depended upon. 

There is no more sensitive, delicately 
constituted organization in the world than 
a highly trained college athletic team, who 
are aware, not only that they are burdened 
temporarily with the good repute of the 
’Varsity, but also of the possibly deplor¬ 
able fact that their friends have backed 
them with the coin of the realm, even to 
the bursting point, and that they are 
looked upon to redeem this confidence. 
All this spirit of apprehension passes off, 
perhaps, during the actual conflict, but 
the tension before actual hostilities are be¬ 
gun is great—far greater than the gen¬ 
eral public conceives. Thus it was that 
the atmosphere of the whole boat-house 
seemed charged with an electric spirit of 
nervousness,—the members of the crew 
assuming a confidence which they did not 
altogether feel. 

Among those, however, who betrayed 


Colton, the Traitor 201 

not the slightest sign of agitation, though 
his very soul was wrapped up in the event, 
was Tom Brown. Arrayed in an emer¬ 
gency uniform of white flannel, and can¬ 
vas shoes, so that he might make a change 
to rowing clothes on the shortest possible 
notice, he lounged about the lower floor 
of the boat-house with an air of indiffer¬ 
ence and nonchalance that was in marked 
contrast with the very obvious, if subdued, 
unrest displayed by the others. As he 
passed, during his promenade, near the 
front door, he met Colton and Ames 
entering. 

“ Hello, Wilton,” greeted Tom in his 
accustomed hearty tone. “ What are you 
doing here? How do you do, Colton? 
How’s the betting? ” 

“ Never saw anything like it,” replied 
Colton, with what was for him a very ex¬ 
traordinary manifestation of enthusiasm. 
“ The whole town has gone crazy. It 
looks like a cinch for the ’Varsity.” 

“ Odds holding good? ” 

“ Good? I should say so,” returned 


202 


Brown of Harvard 


Colton, eying Tom narrowly as he spoke. 
“ Why, in some places you can get three 
to one on Harvard.” 

“No, is that so?” inquired Tom, his 
eyes large with astonishment. “ Three 
to one? Why—say, Colton,” he added, 
his sporting blood aroused, “ do you think 
you could place a little more money for 
me? I ’ve already gone the limit of my 
allowance, but, you know, it’s a funny 
thing, even my old dad—class of ’ 76 , you 
know—has got the fever. Just sent me 
a wire that I could go as far as I liked on 
our boys. Of course I don’t want to be 
reckless, hut, at two to one -——” 

“ I ’ll tell you what I ’ll do,” said Col¬ 
ton confidentially, with the air of one re¬ 
vealing a “ good thing ” as a particular 
favor, “ There is a friend of mine down 
at the Union Boat Club who, strange to 
say, thinks these foreigners stand a show 
of winning. He’s even ready to put up 
even money on the Beefeaters. Now, if 
you say so, I ’ll lay any little bet for 
you on those terms. He’s a ‘ greeny ’ I 
guess, but there’s no reason why you 



Colton, the Traitor 


203 


should n’t pick up his money if he chooses 
to let it lie around loose.” 

“ Even money! ” cried Tom, staring in 
astonishment at the smug, inscrutable face 
of the other. “ Why, the man’s mad. 
No. It’s too much like robbery. You 
can lay $500 for me if you like at two to 
one, but I won’t hold the chap up at even 
money. I believe in giving a fellow a 
chance.” 

At this point Ames stepped between 
the two and placed his hand on Tom’s 
shoulder. 

“ Kid,” he said earnestly, his usually 
pale face slightly flushed, “ don’t you do 
it. Don’t you bet. Our fellows might 
not win.” 

“ Not win,” laughed Tom incredu¬ 
lously. “ What’s got into you, Wilton? 
Don’t you suppose I know what the crew 
can do, especially with that funereal giant 
Thorne at stroke ? It’s like taking the 
milk bottle from baby.” And then turn¬ 
ing to Colton he added. “ Go ahead, old 
man; place $500 for me—two to one, will 
you? ” 


204 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Sure thing,” replied Colton, making 
a memorandum in his note-book, at the 
same time bestowing a significant scowl 
upon Ames, who was the very picture of 
chagrin. 

At this moment the excited, corpulent 
form of Tubby Anderson might have been 
observed at the top of the stairway lead¬ 
ing to the lockers and dressing-rooms. 

“ Say, Colton,” he cried eagerly, “ put 
me down for $25, will you? And by the 
way, I should n’t mind the even money 
proposition, if your friend is so cock¬ 
sure.” 

“Twenty-five? So bad as that?” in¬ 
quired Colton with a grim smile. “All 
right—down you go—even money.” 

“And say,” continued Tubby, “ Bud 
Hall wants all the subs up here to get 
into their rowing things right away.” 

“All right,” replied Tom, moving to¬ 
ward the stairway. He turned around 
abruptly, however, and, after looking 
yearningly at Ames for a moment, 
drawled out: 

“ I sa-ay, Wilton, your sister, Evelyn 


Colton, the Traitor 


205 


—Miss Evelyn—is she—er—quite well? ” 

“ She does n’t seem very cheerful,” re¬ 
plied Ames. 

“ Great! ” responded Tom, slapping his 
leg in delight. “No—no! That is,— 
it’s too bad, Wilton. I’m deucedly 
sorry she is n’t cheerful. Now, if there’s 
any little thing I can do to jolly her along 
-—by the way,” he broke off suddenly, as 
a fearful thought struck him, “ does 
Happy Thurston see her very often? 
Dear old Happy, you know—he’s such a 
nice fellow. Oh, never mind. It’s none 
of my business, of course, only I’m kind 
of—of interested in Happy. He’s such 
a dear friend of mine, you know.” 

Bud Hall, the coach, here appeared 
at the head of the staircase. He was 
garbed, as ever, in his crimson sweater, 
and an experienced eye could detect the 
fact that he was in a highly wrought-up 
condition, a circumstance which he was 
making herculean efforts to conceal for 
the sake of an example to his charges, sev¬ 
eral of whom, being new to the crew, were 
suffering from more or less acute attacks 


206 


Brown of Harvard 


of that dread disease, “ stage fright,” 
which so often affects the very best ath¬ 
letes at a critical moment. 

“Kid Brown!” he shouted, to an ac¬ 
companiment of strong words which are 
regarded as the prerogative of the profes¬ 
sional coach, and which he is fain to take 
full advantage of, “ what the devil do you 
mean by loafing around down there when 
I Ve given orders for all you subs to get 
into your pants? Do you take this for a 
Sunday-school picnic? Haven’t I got 
enough trouble without chasing after you 
like a nurse ? Come up here or I ’ll knock 
your block off! ” 

Tom, thus adjured, and having finished 
his highly satisfactory and rhetorical ad¬ 
dress to Ames, ran lightly up the steps to 
join the eager, excited crowd who were 
preparing for the momentous event of the 
day. 

And, as if making point of the fact that 
Mr. Bud Hall already had troubles 
enough to bear, the front door of the boat¬ 
house opened, and Gerald Thorne entered, 
looking, if possible, more sepulchral, more 


Colton, the Traitor 


20 7 


solemn than ever. On seeing him the 
coach almost danced for very rage. 

“Well, what the-he exclaimed. 

“Where have you been all this time? 
Have you got it in for me? Do you want 
to make me bughouse ? Did n’t you know 
you was to be here over an hour ago? ” 

Thorne stopped as he was about to 
mount the steps, a peculiar dejection in 
his manner. 

“ I’m very sorry, Bud,” he said. “ I 
tried to see my sister before coming over 
to the boat-house—to get a little en¬ 
couragement from her.” Here he looked 
around on Colton and Ames, and his man¬ 
ner became even more diffident, more awk¬ 
ward. “ You see,” he continued apolo¬ 
getically, “I’m not situated like the other 
fellows here. I have no—no friends to— 
give me the glad hand when anything like 
this is going on. So I stopped, as I said, 
to see my sister. I thought perhaps she 
might give me a little send-off, and it 
might be good luck for all of us. I 
waited for her, but she wasn’t there; 
that’s what kept me late.” 



208 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Well, never mind about excuses now,” 
exclaimed Hall brusquely, “ we ’ll give 
you all the send-off you need. You come 
on up here and get into your pants.” 

When Thorne had disappeared into the 
locker room, closely followed by the coach 
and Tubby, who, despite the fact that he 
was to take no active part in the proceed¬ 
ings, betrayed an agitation and anxiety 
wholly at variance with his generally 
chubby, serene aspect, Colton, left alone 
below with Ames, turned viciously upon 
the latter. 

“ What the deuce do you mean,” he 
snarled, “ by telling Brown not to bet? ” 

“ I want to tell everybody,” replied 
Ames doggedly. “ I feel as if I must 
shout it aloud.” 

“ Oh, you do, do you,” cried Colton 
passionately, now thoroughly exasper¬ 
ated, “ you would like to shout it aloud, 
eh? Give the whole snap away, eh? 
Why you—you make me tired. You con¬ 
founded idiot, do you want to queer the 
whole thing? Why the deuce don’t you 
pull yourself together and make some coin 


Colton, the Traitor 209 

on your own account, instead of coming 
this high-handed saint game? Hang it 
all, don’t you know we’ve got the whole 
business fixed? I ’ll lend you some cash 
if you-” 

“No you won’t! ” shouted Ames, turn¬ 
ing on his persecutor fiercely, for once 
rousing himself from the attitude of in¬ 
feriority and submission in which he usu¬ 
ally found himself in the presence of the 
older man, “you won’t, I say! You’ve 
got me where you want me. I’ve done 
this low-down trick because you forced 
me to do it. I’ve got Marian—Miss 
Thorne, to agree to leave town to-day 
because—because,” he said, his voice 
trembling pathetically, “ because I re¬ 
quested her to do so, and she believes I am 
about to follow her! And I’ve given her 
all the money I could scrape together and 
borrow to go away with. But if I had a 
thousand dollars this minute, I’d put it 
on the ’Varsity. Damn you,” he cried 
wildly, gazing at Colton defiantly, “ I’d 
put it every cent on the ’Varsity! ” 

Colton remained for a moment silent, 


14 



210 


Brown of Harvard 


regarding Ames with a look of unspeak¬ 
able disgust. At length, gripping his 
walking-stick nervously, he stepped up 
to him and stared at him long and 
searchingly. 

“ Oh, ho! ” he said, finally. “ So you 
would bet it all on the ’Varsity, would 
you? What a fine, loyal chap you are. 
You would send this unfortunate, unpro¬ 
tected girl away, for fear of your own 
skin, but you would bet a losing game on 
the ’Varsity. Bah! What kind of a hero 
do you take yourself to be, anyhow? 
But look here, my man,” he added suspi¬ 
ciously, “ you ’re not playing me any low- 
down tricks ? The girl’s really going to 
leave, is n’t she? You ’ve carried out our 
agreement as I told you? ” 

“ You left me no alternative,” replied 
Ames sullenly. “ I’ve done just as I 
told you. She has probably left town 
by this time.” 

Colton reached into his pocket and took 
out a sealed and addressed envelope. 

“ I’ve got no grudge against you, 
Ames,” he said slowly, “ but I won’t allow 


Colton, the Traitor 


21 I 


this scheme to fall through on account of 
your monkey business. I have here,” he 
continued, showing the envelope, “ a mes¬ 
sage from Miss Thorne to her brother, 
telling him she has just left town, and 
begging him to follow. You told her to 
send such a note, did you not? ” 

“ I told her to inform her brother that 
she was going away,” replied Ames 
weakly. 

“Well,” said Colton threateningly, 
still not altogether absolved from his sus¬ 
picion, “ if the message does n’t show up 
before the race, this little note will answer 
the purpose, though I wrote it myself, 
anonymously. When Thorne receives 
this note he will, if I know him—and I 
feel quite sure that I do—rush off after 
his sister in spite of all the boat races in 
the world. And listen to me, Ames,” he 
went on sternly, “ I’m not going to lose 
any money by you; there ’s too much at 
stake, and if everything does n’t come up 
to schedule, you know what I ’ll do.” He 
stepped still closer, almost thrusting his 
evil face into that of the younger man. 


212 


Brown of Harvard 


“ That’s all. I guess you ’ll be good. 
But if you fail me, I’d like to see you ex¬ 
plain the situation to Thorne. A fine, 
powerful fellow, is n’t he? One of those 
fellows who don’t care whether school 
keeps or not, when they ’re real mad. 
And,” he added significantly, “ he loves 
his sister more dearly than his life. An 
ugly customer, under certain conditions, 
eh?” 


CHAPTER XVI 


THE NEW STROKE OAR 

W ITH a scramble and a thumping 
and a succession of jumps the eight 
stalwart young men representing the Har¬ 
vard crew, together with the coxswain, 
and half a dozen “ subs,” came crowding 
down the narrow staircase headed by the 
important and now intensely excited Mr. 
Bud Hall, coach. As is the case with 
many professional coaches, Mr. Hall’s 
general bearing was at no time remark¬ 
able for its suavity or gentle complacence, 
being rather a cross between the attitude 
of a mother hen toward her erring and 
recalcitrant brood and of a father inter¬ 
viewing a wayward son in the proverbial 
woodshed. To-day, as the time for the 
race approached, the crisis for which he 
had toiled laboriously and conscientiously 

213 


214 


Brown of Harvard 


for months, and which to him had a far 
greater importance and significance than 
the election of a President, his agitation, 
based upon the honest concern he felt for 
the outcome of the event, reached its cli¬ 
max. Therefore, as a means of appear¬ 
ing at ease, he had adopted the usual but 
perhaps not wholly successful method of 
berating his charges in a manner that, un¬ 
der ordinary circumstances, or if he had 
been anything less than a coach, might 
have called for serious resentment—per¬ 
haps even accompanied by personal 
chastisement. 

“ Now, look here, fellows,” he said to 
the crew as they lined up, on the lower 
floor of the boat-house in the narrow space 
between the suspended rows of shells, 
“ that lobster of an English manager was 
here a while ago to get a look at you and 
maybe offer a few patronizing remarks. 
But I told him you was n’t dressed. He 
wanted to bluff you—see?” 

The men said nothing, but continued to 
gaze at the small, wiry figure of their 
coach and awaited further exhortation. 


The New Stroke Oar 215 


“ That’s what he wants to do,” con¬ 
tinued Mr. Hall earnestly, working his 
arms about with oratorical vigor. “ But 
you fellows will wipe a little of that mo¬ 
lasses off his face before the day is over, 
or my name ’s not Bud Hall. 

“ Remember, now,” he went on, with 
tears of anxiety in his voice, “ I ’ve done 
everything a man could do to train you 
down to an edge for to-day’s race, and if 
any son-of-a-gun of you goes back on 
me, I ’ll—I ’ll—hang it all,” he said, re¬ 
sorting to his customary dreadful threat, 
“ I ’ll knock his block off. Don’t forget 
to put every inch of power into the stroke 
as soon as the blade catches the water. 
Don’t let anybody think that somebody 
else is going to do his work for him. And 
above all, for heaven’s sake,” he added, in 
a fever of agitation, “don’t get excited! 
Remember that the odds are in your favor 
and your friends and every Harvard man 
in the country has put up thousands of 
dollars on you to win out. You can’t af¬ 
ford to lose their money. It would be a 
rank disgrace and shame. 


2l6 


Brown of Harvard 


“And you, Thorne,” he went on tu¬ 
multuously, singling out the huge form 
of the stroke-oar, whose face, topped by 
a shock of black hair, wore its usual solemn 
aspect—an expression certainly not cal¬ 
culated to inspire his fellows with over- 
confidence or even with enthusiasm, “ you 
know, and we all know, that the race prac¬ 
tically depends upon you.” 

The fellows surged about Thorne and 
the coach, making them the centre of 
a curious, absorbed audience. The big 
stroke-oar towered above his weazened 
preceptor even as an oak might have tow¬ 
ered above a slender sapling. Truly had 
Cartright said that the young man’s 
exercise with the axe down in the back- 
woods of Tennessee had given him “ an en¬ 
viable bunch of muscle.” To employ a 
somewhat trite phrase in such cases, the 
sinews of his neck “ stood out like whip 
cords,” and he had that sloping of the 
shoulders peculiar to men of rowing ex¬ 
perience, and indicative of tremendous 
“ pulling ” power. His thighs and calves 
were gnarled and knotted like those of 


The New Stroke Oar 217 

some Greek god in a classical statue, 
while his arms and chest were those of a 
sturdy blacksmith. Little wonder, then, 
that Hall regarded him as the very apple 
of his eye, the one indispensable man in the 
crew,—a human engine capable almost in 
himself of winning the race from the Eng¬ 
lishmen. Thus it was that he addressed 
him with a special tenderness and anxiety, 
somewhat, perhaps, as a Spartan mother 
might have addressed her son on ventur¬ 
ing forth into the shock of battle. 

“ There never has been any such time 
made over this course,” he continued ear¬ 
nestly, “ as under your stroke, but you ’re 
up against men to-day. I’ve seen ’em, 
and you’ve got to light up all the powder 
that’s in you. Remember the instructions 
I’ve given you. Stroke the boys easy 
at the start; let the other fellows wear 
themselves out if they want to, and when 
you get near the finish, well down below 
the Harvard Bridge, why, row like hell— 
take ’em up as high as 40 a minute if you 
want to. These Englishmen are over¬ 
confident and are going to start off at a 


2 18 


Brown of Harvard 


racking clip, just to show us some fancy 
work and see if they can get you rattled 
the first throw out of the box. But don’t 
you do it. Go easy, don’t get flustered, 
and put all your work in the last half 
mile. And Thurston,” he said, abruptly 
turning to the latter individual, who rowed 
“No. 3 ” and who had been the source of 
some anxiety on the part of Mr. Hall on 
account of his disposition to take the mat¬ 
ter of stroking the crew into his own 
hands, “ if you get fussed and kick up a 
muck, just you jump out of the boat and 
drown yourself. You ’ll be more good 
dead than alive. 

“ Now, fellows,” he wound up with a 
sweeping gesture that included all his 
hearers—both the crew and substitutes, 
and even Tubby Anderson, who in the ab¬ 
sorption of the moment had attached him¬ 
self to the annular throng surrounding 
Thorne and the coach—“ put your mind 
on winning, every one of you and forget 
that there’s anything in the world for you 
to-day but good old Harvard! ” 

It was a long oration for Mr. Hall, but 


The New Stroke Oar 219 

feeling that the occasion demanded an un¬ 
usual effort, he had nobly risen to the 
exigencies of the situation and had ex¬ 
hausted all his rhetorical resources to 
stimulate the crew to their best efforts. 
The affair was now “ up to them ”; he 
could do no more. 

With a hearty cheer for their coach, the 
men made their way toward one of the 
large doorways on the river side of the 
boat-house, leading down to the water by 
means of a gangway. The shell had al¬ 
ready been placed on the float, in readi¬ 
ness, at the coxswain’s command, to be 
poised aloft and dropped into the water. 
As the crew crowded toward the door¬ 
way, Colton entered hurriedly at the front 
with a note in his hand and sang out to 
Hall: 

“ I say, Bud—one moment. A mes¬ 
senger boy asked me to hand this note to 
Thorne. It’s marked 4 Urgent.’ ” 

Hall swung around and seized Colton’s 
wrist, his small, wiry frame fairly quiver¬ 
ing with exasperation. 

44 Well, I ’ll be- 


he said, making 



220 


Brown of Harvard 


a futile attempt to snatch the note from 
the other’s grasp. “ Don’t you, an old 
rowing man, know better than to try to 
deliver messages to a member of the crew 
before a race? He can’t have it, con¬ 
found it all, he can’t have it! ” 

“ But I tell you,” insisted Colton, while 
the two struggled sharply in the doorway, 
Hall endeavoring to keep the other from 
passing through on to the gangway, it’s 
marked 4 Urgent.’ Maybe it’s very im¬ 
portant. He must have it. Hey, there, 
Thorne! ” 

Thorne, hearing his name called, stepped 
back into the boat-house. 

“ Here’s a note for you,” cried Colton, 
still scuffling with the coach. 

“ But I say you can’t have it,” replied 
the latter desperately. 44 It’s against all 
the rules. Thorne, go back to the boat, 
man! Go back, damn it, I tell you! ” 

44 Oh, that’s all right, Bud,” said 
Thorne quietly, as he reached over the lat¬ 
ter’s head and took the note from Col¬ 
ton’s outstretched hand. 44 There’s no 
harm in this. It’s my sister’s writing. 


The New Stroke Oar 


221 


She’s probably sending me a word of 
good luck. You know I told you I 
did n’t see her when I went to her room.” 

“ But it’s against the rules. Hang it 
all, man,” fairly shouted Hall, stamping 
his feet in impotent rage, “ am I boss here 
or not? ” 

“ Oh, it ’ll do no harm to read it,” con¬ 
tinued Thorne, who was quite as deter¬ 
mined as the coach, though outwardly he 
appeared calm. 

As Thorne tore open the envelope, Hall 
looked around at the knot of the crew 
who had gathered in the broad doorway 
and were staring at the proceedings with 
open-eyed curiosity. 

“ There—you see—men,” he cried furi¬ 
ously, “ that’s what comes of not learning 
how to obey orders.” 

Thorne paid him no attention. His 
eyes were fairly glued on the sheet of blue 
paper that he held in his hand. 

“Well-” snapped the coach 

impatiently. 

Still Thorne regarded him not, but 
stared at the note as though fascinated. 



222 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Well,” I say, Thorne,” shouted Hall, 
“ here it is only an hour before the start, 
and we Ve got to be towed three miles 
down the river. We can’t wait here 
forever while you run through your 
correspondence.” 

Even then Thorne paid him no heed, 
but stood with gaze transfixed on the 
letter. 

“ Thorne! I say, damn it all,” cried 
the coach, beside himself with passion, 
“the race! The race, man, the race!” 

At last Thorne appeared to become 
conscious of his surroundings. Slowly 
dropping his hand containing the note, he 
gazed stupidly first at Hall, then at Col¬ 
ton, then at the curious crowd of his fel¬ 
lows standing in the doorway. And as 
he looked at them it seemed as if he had 
suddenly been stricken with some great, 
soul-wrecking grief. His brilliant black 
eyes stared wildly, there were great drops 
of perspiration on his brow, and his face, 
usually pale, had taken on an unnatural, 
waxy hue, like to that of death. 

“The race, Thorne!” again shouted 


The New Stroke Oar 


223 


Hall hoarsely. “ What in- are you 

standing there like that for? ” 

Then suddenly Thorne broke into a 
boisterous, mocking, mirthless laugh. 

“ The race! ” he cried, crushing the note 
convulsively in his hand. “ I ’ll not row 
a race to-day! ” 

For a moment there was intense silence 
while the others stared at the big stroke- 
oar as if he had instantly gone mad,—as, 
indeed, they had good reason to believe. 
It was Tubby who was the first to find 
words to express the general astonishment 
and dismay. 

“ Not row? Gee! What the deuce-” 

Tubby’s voice served to rouse Thorne 
to his senses. With a cry of anguish he 
abruptly turned his back on the men and 
bounded up the stairs, two steps at a 
time, tearing at his sweater as he ran. 
The crew and substitutes gazed after him 
in helpless amazement, while Colton, who 
had drawn a little apart from the others, 
looked on the proceedings with an ill-con¬ 
cealed smile of satisfaction. Thorne’s 
movement, however, galvanized Hall into 




224 


Brown of Harvard 


action, and he sped after the retreating 
figure swearing and expostulating. 

“ Oh, I sa-ay,” drawled Tom, working 
his way through the crowd at the door, 
and looking at the coach as he vanished 
from view at the top of the stairway, 
“ what’s up? ” 

“Hell’s up!” responded Madden 
blankly. 

“ Oh, Kid,” almost wept Thurston, 
“ we ’re done for; it’s all off—we ’re done 
for.” 

“ Oh, gee! ” cried Tubby, as he gazed 
dumbfounded at the others, “ my bets, my 
bets! Oh, fellows, chase up there and 
make him row. He’s got to row;—hang 
it all, why don’t you go up there and make 
him row? Gee whiz, my bets-” 

At this instant the distracted figure of 
the coach appeared at the head of the 
stairway and ran pell-mell down into the 
crowd, tearing his hair and almost gibber¬ 
ing in his excitement. 

“ The man—Thorne,” he shouted, “ he’s 
crazy! I can’t do a thing with him. He 
won’t say a word. He’s putting on his 



The New Stroke Oar 225 


street clothes. Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord!” 
Whereupon he fairly danced up and down 
the floor, while the men groaned in 
sympathy. 

Suddenly Hall, realizing, in spite of 
this disaster that threatened to destroy at 
one blow all his confident hopes of suc¬ 
cess, the responsibility that rested upon 
him as coach, stopped, and glaring 
at Tom wildly, said in a heart-broken 
tone: 

“ We’ve got to put a sub in.” 

There was another groan from the 
crowd. 

“ Don’t lose your nerve, boys,” he ex¬ 
claimed, with a desperate attempt at re¬ 
assurance. “ I’ve got to put Tom in at 
stroke! ” 

There was another groan, in which 
Tubby joined with heartfelt agony. 

“ Oh, I sa—ay,” cried Tom, whom the 
rapidity and unexpectedness of recent 
events had rendered half paralyzed with 
astonishment. “ Oh, I sa—ay, Bud, what 
the de-” 

Hall stepped up to Tom and laid his 



226 Brown of Harvard 

hands almost affectionately on his 
shoulders. 

“ Look here, Kid,” he said, speaking 
very solemnly, his voice trembling in a 
manner that was quite unusual, “ this fel¬ 
low Thorne is a mucker. I ’ve said it all 
along, and this proves it. I ought to 
have known better than to put such a 
lobster on the crew—a man who don’t know 
what’s due to his college and his friends, 
—though Lord knows he can row. Now, 
Tom, I’ve got to put you in. You’ve 
been faithful in practice this year, even if 
you did n’t seem to have a look-in to make 
the crew. Well, now is your chance. 
You’ve done good work, but Harvard 
will look to you to-day for better work 
that you ever did before. You’ve got 
the nerve and the judgment, Kid, and it’s 
up to you to make good and stroke the fel¬ 
lows first over the finish line. We’ve all 
been thrown down at the last minute by 
this—farmer, but we’ve still got a chance 
if you do what I know you can do. Go 
in and take stroke, Kid, and win, or—or, 
damn it all, bust your gizzard! " 


The New Stroke Oar 227 


The fierce light of battle danced in 
Tom’s eyes. Row stroke on the ’Varsity 
crew! He, Tom Brown, a mere sub! 
Oh, if he could only make good, as Hall 
had urged,—how proud he would be, how 
proud his dear old dad would be! How 
proud Evelyn- 

“ I will,” he shouted. 

A mighty cheer went up from the crew 
who, strangely enough, felt a new en¬ 
thusiasm with the knowledge that they 
were to be stroked by Tom Brown—a 
favorite with them all, almost an idol with 
some. Once more they broke for the 
float, from which the shell, under the crisp, 
authoritative command of the coxswain, 
was raised and then dropped into the wa¬ 
ter, in true oarsmanship fashion, prepara¬ 
tory to being towed down to the starting 
point by the launch John Harvard. 

Scarcely had they disappeared when 
Thorne, hatless, his hair dishevelled, look¬ 
ing, as Hall had said, as if he had suddenly 
gone crazy, came running down the stairs, 
dashed out of the front door, and thence 
over the Boyleston Bridge toward Cam- 



228 


Brown of Harvard 


bridge, pulling on his coat as he rushed 
recklessly along. 

Colton stood looking after him with a 
grim smile of complacence. 

“ It worked beautifully,” he said softly 
to himself, “ beautifully. Over three 
thousand on the English! Not a bad day’s 
profits.” Here he became aware of the 
presence of Tubby, who stood at the op¬ 
posite door staring off down the river 
whither the crew were disappearing on the 
launch,—the shell, containing a single oc¬ 
cupant with outstretched oars to keep a 
balance through the water, being towed 
behind down to the starting-point below 
Longwood Bridge. 

“ Oh, gee! ” wailed Tubby, “ my bets, 
my bets!—and I’ve discounted my allow¬ 
ance for a whole year.” And then, catch¬ 
ing sight of Colton, he moaned: 

“ Colton, would you mind seeing that 
friend of yours and cancelling my bet? ” 

Colton smiled affably and shook his 
head. 

“ I’m afraid it’s too late, my dear fel¬ 
low, though I must admit this unexpected 


The New Stroke Oar 229 


turn of affairs is rather discouraging. 
But come, let’s take the Veritas down 
for the Basin and see the finish.” 

And as the two boarded the other 
launch, which was to pick up the subs and 
manager and carry them down to the 
Union Boat Club, at the lower end of 
the Basin, Tubby repeated dolefully to 
himself: 

“ Finish? Yes—I see my finish all 
right. Oh, my bets, my bets! ” 


CHAPTER XVII 


THE RACE 



HE John Harvard, having on 


* board the coach, crew, and subs, and 
towing the delicate racing machine, pro¬ 
ceeded down the river at a business-like 
clip. As it passed under the Boylston 
Bridge, which leads from Soldiers’ Field 
into Cambridge, it was greeted by a wild 
yell of encouragement from a crowd of 
small boys and others who had mounted 
this vantage point for the purpose of see¬ 
ing the opening act of the aquatic drama 
which was soon to have its denouement 
farther down the river. The college men 
on the launch acknowledged these hearty 
salutations by friendly wavings of the 
hands, and the boat continued on down 
the stream, passing under a succession 
of bridges, until it finally reached the 


The Race 


231 


starting-point just below the Long wood 
Bridge. As the launch hove to, the shell 
was drawn alongside, the men got aboard 
and awaited the coming of the English 
crew. 

The latter had made ready for the race 
at the Boston Athletic Association boat¬ 
house, at the end of the Basin, immedi¬ 
ately alongside the Union Boat Club, 
near the finish flag. Almost immediately 
after the arrival of the John Harvard 
at the Longwood Bridge, the English¬ 
men, who had pulled up from the end of 
the Basin in their shell for the purpose of 
a little preliminary exercise, came upon 
the scene. They were a husky, sturdily 
built lot of young fellows, and as they 
rowed easily through the water it was 
quite evident that they were men of sea¬ 
soned training, and that their manager 
was not altogether moved by the spirit of 
“ bluff ” when he had intimated, as he had 
done some days before, that the visitors 
would give a very excellent account of 
themselves. 

The members of the Harvard crew 


232 Brown of Harvard 

gazed from their shell at these antago¬ 
nists with eager curiosity. If there was any 
weak-hearted among them he might well 
have experienced a sinking of his hopes as 
he observed the apparent confidence and 
machine-like precision with which the 
fragile shell was propelled through the 
water to the starting-point. Truth to 
tell, however, there was quite as much 
apprehension among the foreigners— 
“ Beefeaters ” as they had been famil¬ 
iarly dubbed by the student body—as there 
was among their antagonists. This was 
the most trying part of the ordeal for 
both crews—the few moments just prior 
to the actual beginning of hostilities, 
when they had no opportunity to allay 
their nervousness by actual physical ef¬ 
fort, but were obliged to place themselves, 
as it were, on exhibition, the one before 
the other. It is so with all college ath¬ 
letic contests. A football team, for ex¬ 
ample, is never so much tortured with 
anxiety and gloomy foreboding as when 
it comes on to the field and indulges in a 
preliminary passing about of the pigskin 


The Race 


233 


—a form of exercise apparently resorted 
to for the purpose of “ warming up,” 
but, as the coaches well know, in reality 
with the object of keeping the men in ac¬ 
tion and of preventing them as far as pos¬ 
sible from becoming “ rattled.” 

No one recognized this circumstance 
more thoroughly than Mr. Bud Hall, 
coach. After “ sizing up ” critically the 
English eight as they pulled with a lei¬ 
surely and graceful stroke toward the 
starting flag, he picked up a megaphone, 
and proceeded to yell out to his charges in 
a tone that bore well within the enemy’s 
lines: 

“You’ve got a cinch, boys! They’re 
putting up an elegant bluff. Don’t let 
’em scare you by any parlor tricks like 
this. It’s all very well to take pleasure 
spins when you have n’t got another crew 
behind pulling like the devil to get the 
lead. They ’re — they ’re — lobsters! ” 
And then in a subdued voice to Tom: 
“ Don’t forget what I told Thorne, Kid, 
about holding yourself in hand until you 
get below Harvard Bridge. These fel- 


234 


Brown of Harvard 


lows are no good! Do you hear? No 
good! You’ve got a cinch, Kid—a 
cinch! ” 

The intent of Mr. Hall’s remarks was 
admirable, and, in fact, his address did 
serve somewhat to restore whatever wan¬ 
ing confidence the Harvard crew might 
have felt. It was Tom himself, however, 
who boldly came to the front with a re¬ 
mark that utterly routed any misgivings 
as to the outcome. 

“ I sa—ay, Bud,” he replied, in his 
characteristically dawdling tone, “ those 
chaps look awfully pretty in dress parade, 
but we’ve got the stuff to make them look 
like two-spots when it comes to a show¬ 
down.” 

Simple words they were, and yet they 
served to cheer the crew immensely. The 
men felt at once that, whatever Tom’s 
shortcomings as a stroke from a physical 
point of view might be, his spirit, and 
courage—his nerve—were undaunted. 
There was a palpable lessening of the ten¬ 
sion after he had relieved himself of his 
brief but significant harangue. 


The Race 


^35 


In the meantime the Veritas, having 
come up rapidly in the wake of the other 
launch, ran alongside, and picking up the 
subs and manager, and a few others whose 
usefulness in a regatta is largely a matter 
of conjecture, started on ahead at full 
speed for the end of the Basin. 

Down at the Union Boat Club, which 
faces directly up the river so that the 
spectator can gain an excellent “ fore¬ 
shortened ” view of the race, so to speak, 
a gay throng had assembled. The bal¬ 
cony of the club-house was massed with 
invited guests—friends and relatives of 
the crew, adherents of the Englishmen, 
numbers of favored undergraduates who 
had been fortunate enough to gain cards 
of admission. It is needless to say that 
among the throng were Mrs. Ames and 
Evelyn and Edith. The men on the bal¬ 
cony were gorgeously arrayed in every 
conceivable style of outlandish college 
costume, presenting a variety of coloring 
that easily surpassed the comparatively 
modest frocks of the women. Among 
them were crowds of “ old grads,” dis- 


230 


Brown of Harvard 


tinguished as to their club or society affili¬ 
ations by the hues of their hat-bands,— 
the Porcellian green and white, the “ A. 
D.,” a mixture of hues difficult to name, 
the “ Owl,” the “ Spee,” the 44 Fly,” the 
44 Digamma,” the 44 Gas-House,” and 
numbers of others. Many who were un¬ 
able to find room on the balcony were 
gathered on the lower floor in the shell 
rooms and the gymnasium, or on the float. 
These were largely of the 44 unattached ” 
sort—those who, in college lingo, were not 
44 fussers,” and were made up mostly of the 
sporting contingent, who were still busy 
44 laying odds,”— or rather attempting to 
do so, as the number of English sympa¬ 
thizers had shrunk to remarkably small 
proportions. The news of Thorne’s de¬ 
fection had not yet reached the Boat Club, 
though it was being borne down rapidly 
on the launch Veritas, through the me¬ 
dium of Mr. Tubby Anderson, who was 
fairly bursting with the dread import of 
his tidings. 

Mrs. Ames, Wilton, and the two girls 
occupied a point of vantage in a corner 


The Race 


237 


well to the front of the balcony, where they 
could get a fine view of the basin up as 
far as Harvard Bridge. Beyond this 
bridge no glimpse of the crews was to be 
seen, and it was not until the boats had 
passed under the arches of Harvard 
Bridge that the eye was able to detect such 
a slight, slender thing as a shell on the 
water—the nine men being strung out al¬ 
most straight in the line of vision. For 
this reason the Charles is not an ideal 
sheet of water for a boat race as far as the 
spectators are concerned, especially if 
they are stationed at the finish,—lacking 
that very desirable feature present at the 
Thames where the crowds can accompany 
the flying crews on moving grandstands 
along the railroad track that skirts the 
banks. This defect, however, is largely 
made up for by a circumstance peculiar to 
the place. The left, or Boston shore of 
the river, looking up from the end of the 
Basin, ranges behind long rows of red 
brick buildings—an extension of Beacon 
Street reaching out into the tradition¬ 
ally aristocratic region of the Back Bay. 


23 B 


Brown of Harvard 


These buildings are separated from the 
“ sea wall ” by a monotonous succession 
of prim, rectangular, board-befenced 
back yards, and on the verge of the sea 
wall is a wide cinder road protected from 
the water by a strong iron railing. Dur¬ 
ing every important regatta this railing 
for a distance of a mile or more, is fringed 
by a crowd of interested spectators, and, 
by a system of unconscious wireless tele¬ 
graphy, consisting of indiscriminate howls 
and shrieks and roars from the populace, 
and by more or less concerted cheering 
from the students, some stray intimation 
of affairs is conveyed to the watchers at 
the end of the Basin as soon as the crews 
dart into sight from under the arches of 
Harvard Bridge. 

It was nearly three o’clock, the time for 
the race to begin, when the Veritas , con¬ 
taining Tubby, Colton, and the others 
hove into view and made for the Union 
Boat Club landing. The crowd stared 
at the launch curiously, for it was not the 
custom for the Veritas to come down 
to the finish line before the race. 


The Race 


239 


“ Why, it’s Tubby,” cried Edith, as 
soon as the launch had made fast, and that 
corpulent individual, fairly bursting with 
the import of his tidings, tumbled pre¬ 
cipitately on to the float. 

“ Hello, Tubby,” she cried, waving her 
handkerchief, and smiling down at him 
sweetly, “ how did you leave the boys? ” 
Tubby, catching sight of his friends, 
made no immediate response, but, working 
his way desperately through the throng on 
the float and on the lower floor, eventually 
arrived on the balcony, breathless with 
excitement, his chubby countenance the 
very type of abandoned grief and woe. 

“ Oh, gee,” he gasped, when at last he 
had emerged through the crowd that sur¬ 
rounded the women, “ my bets—my bets! ” 
For a moment he was unable to proceed, 
but could only lean feebly up against the 
railing for support. 

Evelyn glanced at him in surprise, while 
Wilton bit his lip, to hide his confusion. 

“ Your bets,” she repeated, anxiously, 
“ why—what do you mean, Tubby ? ” 

By this time a number of others on the 


240 


Brown of Harvard 


balcony, observing from Tubby’s unusual 
manner that something was amiss, began 
to cluster about the little knot in the 
corner. 

Tubby gazed at them mournfully, help¬ 
lessly, and then cast his thunderbolt, after 
the manner of a very clumsy Jove. 

“ Oh, gee,” he wailed, Thorne is n’t 
going to row! ” 

A cry of astonishment rose from the 
crowd, and there was a moment of intense 
silence during which Tubby continued to 
stare from one to the other of his friends, 
the embodiment of corpulent despair. 

“ Thorne is n’t going to row? ” repeated 
one of the men, “ why—what is the 
matter? ” 

“ Oh, I don’t know,” moaned Tubby, 
“ only that he’s—he’s crazy; got a note 
or something and rushed out of the boat¬ 
house as if he had suddenly gone daffy. 
Gee whiz—my bets! I was banking on 
him. It’s a shame—a fake. The race 
ought to be called off! ” 

“ Who is going to take his place at 
stroke?” asked another. 


The Race 


241 


“ Oh, that’s the worst of it,” cried 
Tubby. “ Bud Hall has put in Tom 
Brown, and you all know he’s no way 
equal to Thorne. He’s not in Thorne’s 
class. And here I ’ve put up every cent I 
could scrape together, some at two to one. 
It isn’t fair I say. It’s robbery!” 

A murmur of surprise quivered about 
among those on the balcony and, with a 
rapidity usual under such circumstances, 
the sad tidings were conveyed down¬ 
stairs, where the sporting element were 
still endeavoring to get their money on 
Harvard at two to one. 

Evelyn, a bright red spot burning in 
either cheek, shook Tubby violently by 
the arm. 

“ What do you mean,” she exclaimed, 
with delightfully inconsistent loyalty, 
“ by saying that Tom is not in Thorne’s 
class? You know it is n’t so. Tom rows 
just—just beautifully!” And, her eyes 
burning with excitement, she continued: 
“ He’s every bit as good as Mr. Thorne. 
I’m sure Harvard will win. Shame on 
you, Mr. Anderson! What right have 

16 


242 


Brown of Harvard 


you to carry on so about your silly little 
bets? Oh, if I were only a man! I—I 
would just double my bets on the crew! ” 

Tubby looked up at her curiously. 

“ Why,” he exclaimed, in genuine as¬ 
tonishment, “ I thought you were n’t 
friends with Tom.” 

“ That has n’t anything to do with it,” 
retorted Evelyn, flushing beautifully. 
“ I know Tom can row splendidly, and— 
and—he must win,” she cried, somewhat 
irrelevantly, fairly carried away by ex¬ 
citement, and shedding in an instant all 
the resentment she had felt on account of 
the unfortunate derelictions of her sweet¬ 
heart, “ he must win, he—he—oh, dear,” 
she cried, turning abruptly toward Mrs. 
Ames, “ don’t you think he will win, 
mother? ” 

Mrs. Ames smiled sweetly on her 
daughter, albeit there was a certain tinct¬ 
ure of agitation even in her own usually 
self-composed manner. Before she could 
reply, however, Tubby once more 
intervened. 

“ It’s all very well for you to talk like 


The Race 


243 


that,” he said with a most woe-begone 
expression, “ but you have n’t followed 
racing the way I have. You have n’t gone 
down in your jeans—er—I mean, you 
have n’t put up all your coin for the next 
year on the strength of that fellow Thorne 
stroking the crew. Oh, the—the lobster! 
If I only had him here, I’d—I’d-” 

Whatever awful vengeance Tubby 
would have wreaked on the unfortunate 
person of the recalcitrant stroke oar was 
never made known to the world, for his 
voice was lost in a sudden, tumultuous, 
hilarious uproar from the left bank of 
the river. 

“ There they come! There they 
come!” cried Edith, clapping her hands 
in a truly feminine exhibition of excite¬ 
ment, not having the slightest suspicion 
as to which crew, if either, was ahead. 

In an instant every eye was fixed in¬ 
tently on Harvard Bridge, which, though 
a mile distant, was sharply outlined in the 
clear air of the spring afternoon. 

Nothing as yet was to be seen saving 
some stray gasoline launches which, 



244 


Brown of Harvard 


despite the most earnest efforts of those 
who were patrolling the river, persisted in 
making themselves obnoxious by skim¬ 
ming along the edge of the course, as al¬ 
most invariably happens no matter how 
important an event is to be decided. 
Otherwise the broad stretch of water ex¬ 
tending from the finish line near the Union 
Boat Club up to the bridge appeared as 
unruffled and devoid of excitement as 
mid-sea during a perfect calm. Evelyn, 
whose interest in the race had, strange to 
say, manifoldly increased since Tubby’s 
disastrous revelation, swept the vista of 
water before her with a pair of field 
glasses (a gift, by the way, from one Tom 
Brown, to be used for this particular oc¬ 
casion) , but, though everything in the line 
of sight was duly magnified, she could de- 
tect no sign of either crew. 

The crowd on the bank up the river, 
however, seemed to be better informed. 
From them came a continual succession 
of yells, and howls, and cheers,—though 
whether they were cheers of exultation or 


The Race 


245 


cheers of encouragement it was quite im¬ 
possible to tell. 

“ Oh, Evie,” exclaimed Edith, who 
manifestly greatly overestimated the mag¬ 
nifying power of even such an excellent 
pair of glasses as Evelyn possessed, “ can 
you see Clax—I mean them? Who’s 
ahead? ” 

Tubby dropped into a chair, and, seiz¬ 
ing great mops of his hair in either hand, 
moaned dolefully: 

“ Don’t look any longer, Evie—that is 
—Miss Ames. It’s all off. Oh, gee 
whiz, my bets—and I have n’t even got 
meal tickets for the rest of the year.” 

The shouting on the banks continued 
to grow louder and louder. Those in the 
balcony could see the people on the shore 
excitedly prancing up and down, waving 
their arms, leaning over the iron railing, 
and occasionally running to and fro actu¬ 
ated and inspired by no visible cause or 
pretext whatsoever. 

Even Mrs. Ames, gentle, refined, and 
quiet creature that she was, began to be 


246 Brown of Harvard 

infected by the spirit of the occasion. 
Turning to her daughter, who still con¬ 
tinued to stare through the glasses up the 
river, she asked, affecting a calmness 
which she did not altogether feel: 

“ Do you see them yet, Evie? Who is 
leading? ” 

At this moment, even to the unaided 
eyes of those standing on the balcony, two 
slim, elusive dots appeared, almost as if 
by magic, on the river below Harvard 
Bridge, evidently having passed under 
different arches. There was nothing to 
indicate that they were two racing shells, 
impelled by sixteen brawny young men 
whose very souls were wrought up in the 
effort of achieving victory, except that 
now and then the flash of oars shimmered 
momentarily in the bright sunlight, and as 
abruptly vanished. 

Steadily, but slowly as it seemed to the 
watchers on the balcony of the boat-house, 
the crews approached. From mere dots 
on the water they gradually began to as¬ 
sume definite shapes, though even then 
it was impossible to distinguish the men 


The Race 


247 


in the shells; a not remarkable circum¬ 
stance considering that all the members 
of the two crews wore monotonously simi¬ 
lar “ gym ” shirts, that they were bare¬ 
headed, bare-armed, and that there was 
nothing about the boats themselves that 
served to identify them even at close 
range. 

In the meantime the crowds on the bank 
became more and more excited and vo¬ 
ciferous. It seemed as if the iron railing 
on which most of these riparian spec¬ 
tators were leaning had become charged 
with an electric current, causing them 
to dance about like so many jiggling 
marionettes. 

Evelyn, with half-opened mouth, her 
breath coming in quick little gasps, con¬ 
tinued to gaze at the approaching crews 
with absorbed interest. 

“ Oh, Evie,” pleaded Edith, who is 
ahead ? It’s the English crew. I know 
it is. Oh, I know it,” she added dismally. 

Here Tubby, with a groan, sank fur¬ 
ther into his chair and buried his face in 
his hands. 


Brown of Harvard 


248 

“Oh—the—the—mucker!” he wailed. 
“If I had only known—if I had only 
known! ” 

“ You hush up,” cried Evelyn sharply, 
lowering her glasses for a moment and 
looking down at Tubby’s abject figure 
with unspeakable scorn. “ You ’ve no 
right to talk so. Harvard must win. 
Tom rows just beautifully. It’s—it’s 
mean of you to talk so! ” 

“ The English crew is ahead! ” cried 
Edith. “ Oh, they are getting ahead. 
They are winning.” 

“It is n’t so! ” retorted Evelyn, once 
more levelling her glasses on the rival con¬ 
testants. “ It is n’t so at all. Oh, yes, it 
is,” she added despairingly, though it 
would have puzzled a more experienced 
eye than hers to distinguish one crew from 
the other at the distance. “ They ’re 
gaining! Oh, why do they go so fast? I 
—I—oh, I did n’t know a race was so 
short. Just think—less than two miles; 
not enough to give our boys a chance. It 
is n’t fair. 

“ O dear, they ’re more than half way, 


The Race 249 

and the Englishmen are still gaining— 
half a length ahead! ” And then, turning 
to Tubby, she implored: 

44 Oh, Tubby—Mr. Anderson—don’t 
you think our men are gaining—just a 
little bit? Oh, they must, they must! 
No! The others are creeping ahead. 
Oh, if I could only help! ” 

But poor Tubby was beyond affording 
solace, even at this pathetic appeal. He 
sat miserably in his chair, though all the 
others were standing, and gazed forlornly 
out on the momentous drama that was 
being enacted before his eyes, crushed, 
overwhelmed by his sorry fate, wholly 
convinced that all hope was lost. 

The crews had now covered fully half 
the course between Harvard Bridge and 
the finish flags—being about half a mile 
distant. So near were they that the out¬ 
lines of the men could be fairly distin¬ 
guished, and the desperate energy of their 
efforts could be gauged by the sudden 
glimmering flash and disappearance of 
the oar blades. 

Both crews were rowing at a fast clip, 


250 


Brown of Harvard 


as is likely to be the case over a short 
course, and from time to time each side 
spurted in response to the violent, raucous 
entreaty of their coxswain. 

On and on they came, past the crowd on 
the open-air balcony of the University 
Club, past the squat, fussy, impudent 
gasoline launches that had gathered near 
the Boston bank to be “ in at the finish 
past the rows of frenzied spectators who 
lined the fence-rail back of the sea wall,— 
silently, desperately, fiercely onward. 

They were near enough now to enable 
those with glasses to distinguish them ab¬ 
solutely, one from the other. After hav¬ 
ing passed the University Club it was 
plainly seen that the English crew was 
the one well in toward the Cambridge 
shore, where the water was comparatively 
smooth, though this manoeuvre involved 
a slight detour, while the Harvard crew 
held to the middle of the river, being ham¬ 
pered more or less by the roughness of the 
water caused by the police patrol and 
pleasure launches, which exasperated the 
spectators by constantly verging on the 


The Race 


251 


course. Each crew was rowing about 
thirty-six strokes to the minute. As the 
shells were urged gracefully onward, the 
men bending to their work with the regu¬ 
larity of machines, it seemed as if the crews 
and their boats constituted strange species 
of huge water spiders, actuated by some 
common principle, bent on accomplishing 
some common object. 

“ Oh,” cried Evelyn suddenly, as she 
continued to gaze earnestly through the 
glasses, “ I can see Tom! Oh, Tom, Tom, 
row, row, row! Oh, Tom, you he a 
de-” 

Here Mrs. Ames, in her motherly man¬ 
ner, placed her hand soothingly on the arm 
of her palpitating daughter. 

“ Hush, Evie,” she whispered warn- 
ingly, “ remember you are not alone.” 

But Evelyn was fairly quivering with 
excitement. The race had now, as far 
as she was concerned, been reduced to a 
matter of Tom Brown. Poor Harvard, 
for her at least, was lost in the tumult of 
her anxiety that her dear, devoted Tom 
should prove a hero. 



252 Brown of Harvard 

“ He’s going faster! ” she cried, “ he—- 
oh! ” 

At this psychological moment a tre¬ 
mendous cheer arose from the crowd on 
the bank. Hats and caps were tossed 
wildly into the air, and there was a sud¬ 
den frenzied scramble down the wide cin¬ 
der road along the shore toward the lower 
end of the Basin. 

“ They ’re closing up the gap,” almost 
shrieked Evelyn in a paroxysm of joy, 
abandoning her now useless field glasses. 
“ They ’re creeping up. Tom is creep¬ 
ing up. I can see the coxswain yell¬ 
ing to them through the megaphone. 
Oh, pull like—like—everything, Tom! 
Faster! Faster! Oh, I wish he could hear 
me! He’s got to win—he’s got to win. 
Look, mamma, they’re almost even!” 

Aye, it was even as she had said. The 
two crews were critically near the finish 
line and Harvard, rowing with a steady, 
rapid stroke, had gradually but surely 
nibbled off the advantage that had been 
gained by the Englishmen at the start so 
that the two were now on about even terms. 


The Race 


253 


“ Oh, Tom, you de-,” exclaimed 

Evelyn almost involuntarily, when she 
was again repressed by her mother. 

“ Oh, anyhow,” she cried, “ the Eng¬ 
lishmen are beaten! They ’re beaten! 
They ’re tired out, and Tom—Harvard 
is n’t. Our boys are going faster every 
minute. Oh, such a little way! Pull, 
Tom! ” she cried, leaning far over the rail¬ 
ing of the balcony despite her mother’s 
expostulations and restraining arm, 
“ Pull—pull, Tom! Oh, they ’re ahead! ” 
she shouted, jumping up and down and 
clapping her hands. “ Tom’s ahead. 
Oh, Tom Brown, you ’re winning—you ’re 
winning! Oh, Tom!” she gasped with 
one final effort, as the Harvard crew, still 
fresh and collected, shot over the winning 
line, a full length ahead of its competi¬ 
tors, “ you’ve WON! " 

It is a sad thing from a literary point 
of view to be obliged to announce that 
“ pandemonium reigned.” That is a 
fearfully overworked expression. Yet it 
describes exactly the situation in the Union 
Boat Club after the Harvard crew had 



254 


Brown of Harvard 


snatched itself so gloriously from defeat 
to victory. The men—even the elderly, 
gray-haired “ grads ”—after having em¬ 
braced their nearest neighbors without 
discrimination, and almost wept for very 
joy, began to shout and sing, and prance 
about the place like mad,—upsetting camp 
chairs, “ wickers,” tables, crashing to 
atoms the glasses in which “ claret cup ” 
and other innocuous beverages had been 
served, and then rushed, with a whirl¬ 
wind of triumph, down the stairs to the 
float to receive the victorious crew. 

In an instant, after the shell had been 
pulled over to the Boat Club landing— 
as is customary after regattas on the river 
when rowed down stream—the coxswain 
found his occupation gone. If he had 
counted upon making a stunning impres¬ 
sion by bringing his shell in an orderly 
fashion up to the float, commanding the 
crew to unship oars, and go through the 
routine prescribed for such occasions, he 
had reckoned without the demoniacal gang 
that awaited his arrival. 

For no sooner were the crew within 


The Race 


2 55 


grabbing distance than they were uncere¬ 
moniously yanked out by their enthusi¬ 
astic and boisterous admirers, and toted 
aloft in triumph. The beaming, heavenly 
happy person of Tom Brown, owing to 
his situation in the boat, was the last to 
come in for their delicate attentions, but, 
judging from the energy with which he 
was received, there was no doubt whatever 
as to his status. He was the hero—the 
man who had stepped into the breach and, 
despite the heavy handicap imposed by 
the unexpected defection of Thorne,—the 
idol who had saved the day. A dozen 
hands seized him by his arms, his neck, his 
head, his “ gym ” shirt—by any available 
purchase, and in an instant he was raised 
on high on the shoulders of as many of 
his delirious admirers as could conven¬ 
iently place themselves under him, and 
borne up the gang-plank toward the boat¬ 
house. Hot, sweating, panting with ex¬ 
citement and with the exertion of the race, 
he was yet the very incarnation of joy, 
and for once he neglected to drawl out 
his protesting, “ I sa—ay.” But one thing 


256 Brown of Harvard 

was lacking to fill to overflowing his in¬ 
toxicating cup of happiness, and that 
want was not long in being supplied. 
For, as he was carried aloft on the shoul¬ 
ders of his tumultuous adorers toward the 
entrance of the boat-house, he chanced to 
glance up at the balcony, and there he 
saw the idol of his heart,—Evelyn, beam¬ 
ing down upon him, her eyes drowned in 
tears of pride and delight; smiling upon 
him with a smile that assured him that all 
his previous shortcomings—assuming, of 
course, they had been such—had been 
miraculously forgiven. And as he was 
hustled and jammed through the door¬ 
way, she snatched a bunch of violets from 
her waist and, leaning far over the balcony, 
tossed them into his eager, outstretched 
hand, even while his captors, in the wild 
abandon of their frenzy, resorted to the 
old familiar refrain, which, being taken 
up by the crowd, was rendered with a 
vigor and sincerity which it had never 
known before: 

“ Tom Brown’s body is alive and feeling good, 



She snatched a bunch of violets from her waist and tossed them into his eager, outstretched hand. 





































/ 


* 































The Race 


257 


Tom Brown’s body, here’s a fact that’s 
understood, 

Tom Brown’s body’s got a head that’s made 
of wood, 

As we go marching on! ” 

But alas for Tom, and alas for Evelyn! 
He had been seated scarcely five minutes 
in the secluded nook of the balcony, among 
his friends, clad once more in his sweater 
for propriety’s sake, and explaining, be¬ 
tween gasps, how the whole thing had hap¬ 
pened, when there was a rush of steps up 
the staircase, and Thorne, wild-eyed, grief- 
stricken, hatless, in a fever of excitement, 
darted recklessly into the midst of the 
party and seized the hero by the wrist in 
a tremendous grip, while the others be¬ 
came suddenly silent, and looked upon the 
intruder in amazement. 

“Yes!” cried Thorne passionately, 
in a highly melodramatic fashion, “ hail 
him as a hero! Pet him, cheer him, cod¬ 
dle him—but I tell you, he is a scoundrel 
and a—thief! ” 

The silence became, if possible, even 
more tense, while Tom looked up at his 
17 


258 Brown of Harvard 

accuser fairly dazed with astonishment. 

“ He is a thief and a scoundrel, I say,” 
cried Thorne, his voice hoarse with emo¬ 
tion ,— 44 for he has stolen—my sister! ” 

Tom stared about him as if searching 
for some clue to this wholly unexpected 
riddle. So dumbfounded was he that he 
had no thought for any feeling of resent¬ 
ment, no words for hot denial. Mrs. 
Ames was the first to speak. 

“ Oh, Tom, dear—what does he mean? 
Deny this absurd charge.” 

There was another moment of awkward, 
solemn silence, and then Tom once more 
received the blessed gift of speech. 

“ Oh—I sa—ay,” he ejaculated, like 
one in a dream, 4 4 what the deuce do you 
mean, Thorne? Of course I deny it. 
The man must be mad! ” 

44 Mad, am I?” shouted Thorne, his 
brilliant black eyes blazing with wrath, 
as he snatched a bit of paper from his 
pocket and held it fluttering out toward 
the little group. 44 Can he deny this 
check? 

44 He sends my sister money! My 


The Race 


259 


poor child,” he added, his voice trembling 
pitiably. “ She was just about to leave 
town when I found her, and was trying to 
cash this check. Oh, God! ” he cried in a 
tone of such anguish that even Tom’s 
sympathizers could not fail to be touched. 
And then abruptly resorting to his threat¬ 
ening manner, he exclaimed, 44 The check, 
—you gave my sister money and she was 
about to leave town. Explain this check, 
you miserable, purse-proud snob! ” 

Still Tom was unable to return a word 
of protest. Taking the slip of paper from 
Thorne’s hand he gazed at it in a trance. 

44 My check! ” he muttered, 44 for three 
hundred dollars! ” 

44 Ah, you see,” cried Thorne, turning 
around upon the others, 44 he cannot deny 
it. His check, for three hundred dollars, 
given to my sister, so that she might leave 
town! ” And then, wheeling about upon 
the woful figure of the totally perplexed 
Tom, he continued, more deliberately: 

44 1 must have an explanation from you, 
sir. I must have an understanding. This 
is no time or place,” he added, glancing 


26 o 


Brown of Harvard 


about upon the women, “ but you must 
explain this thing to me, before you are a 
day older, do you hear? I demand an 
explanation.” 

Turning upon his heel he darted toward 
the doorway, and his steps could be heard 
as he tore rapidly down the staircase, while 
Tom and his friends looked after him as 
if he had been some unpleasant creature 
from another world. Again it was Mrs. 
Ames who spoke. 

“ Tom,” she said,—and her manner had 
assumed an unaccustomed tincture of dis¬ 
tance and formality, 44 Tom, what have 
you to say? ” 

Tom gazed long and earnestly at the 
fateful bit of paper in his hands, and then 
cast his glance about among his friends. 
As he did so he caught sight of Wilton 
Ames’s despairing face appearing anx¬ 
iously over his mother’s shoulder. He 
started with a sudden comprehension, and 
was about to speak, but Ames made, un¬ 
seen by the others, a gesture eloquent with 
mute appeal. Tom looked from mother 
to son, and slyly at Evelyn, and—then 


The Race 


261 


dropped his head, abject, forlorn, appar¬ 
ently convicted of all that Thorne had 
accused him. 

“ What have I to say? ” he repeated, as 
he gazed once more with a fascinated 
glance at the check,—“ why—nothing! ” 


CHAPTER XVIII 


AN ALL-NIGHT SESSION 

HERE was a dinner that night, after 



I the race, to the victorious Harvard 
crew, to their unsuccessful though un¬ 
daunted rivals, and to a number of devoted 
adherents of both sides, at the Union train¬ 
ing table, and when the dinner was over 
Tom and Madden returned to their rooms, 
accompanied by Happy Thurston, Tubby, 
Bernard, Jean, and Van Rensselaer. 
The men, as they passed through the Yard 
and along the beautiful elm-lined streets, 
were unusually quiet and restrained. 
The spirit of elation and hilarity which 
might very naturally have been expected 
to betray itself under the circumstances 
was wholly absent. Very deliberately, on 
arriving at Madden’s and Tom’s study, 


An All-Night Session 263 

the men disposed themselves in lounging 
attitudes, all, except those who were in 
training, devoting themselves to their 
pipes in an unusual, gloomy, almost em¬ 
barrassed silence,—a silence so marked 
and persistent that the place seemed 
strangely to take on the hushed aspect of 
a cloistered retreat. From time to time, 
down on the street arose, at first faintly, 
and then swelling in volume, and finally 
dying away in the soft distance of the 
night the cheers and shouts and songs of 
various belated revellers returning to their 
rooms after a season devoted to loyal and 
industrious celebration. Xow and again 
one or the other of the men from sheer 
exhaustion fell asleep where he sat or 
sprawded, as the case might be,—espe¬ 
cially Tubby, who at once sought the 
favored window-seat, and there at once 
abandoned himself to sweet repose, snor¬ 
ing tumultuously on his back with mouth 
wide open, occasionally gasping and gurg¬ 
ling and snorting from the very pro¬ 
fundity of his slumbers. 

Tom alone, of all the crowd, kept 


264 Brown of Harvard 

awake, sitting uneasily in his chair before 
the desk, or now and then rising nervously 
and pacing the floor, looking about on his 
friends with a glance of baffled apprehen¬ 
sion, quite at variance with the customary 
jollity and whole-souled good-fellowship 
of his manner. He knew that as a mem¬ 
ber of the crew he ought to have turned 
in long ago, yet he was still dazed, over¬ 
whelmed by the miserable revelation that 
had occurred so dramatically, so unex¬ 
pectedly, so disastrously on the balcony of 
the Boat Club immediately after the race. 
He could not get from before his mind’s 
eye the frenzied, grief-stricken figure of 
the unfortunate stroke-oar, the bitterness 
with which Thorne had denounced him, 
the forlorn, beseeching, mute appeal of 
Wilton Ames, his sweetheart’s brother, 
the shocked, horrified expression on Eve¬ 
lyn’s face, the heart-breaking knowledge 
that this same Wilton had, for some un¬ 
accountable reason, forged his name to a 
check. And above all there was present 
in his mind the conviction that now, as on 
a former occasion, no matter what might 


An All-Night Session 265 

happen, he was bound by every sense of 
duty to protect him from discovery and 
disgrace, even at the possible sacrifice of 
the confidence and affection of these his 
dearest friends. 

It had all happened so swiftly, so unex¬ 
pectedly—so cruelly! He had been so 
proud, so exultant, so happy—so su¬ 
premely happy; only to have his cup of 
happiness dashed rudely to earth, and to 
be made an object of hatred by Thorne, 
and, well, perhaps of suspicion by the 
others. Not for a moment did he feel a 
particle of resentment toward Thorne. 
Rather he sympathized with him in his 
tremendous rage. Nor did the unselfish¬ 
ness, the inherent optimism, the nobility of 
his character permit him to regard Ames 
with any other than a sense of genuine sor¬ 
row and pity. 

But—well, if things only could have 
been different! If this whole wretched 
business had never occurred! The very 
fact that his friends still believed in him, 
despite the ominous gloom that had set¬ 
tled over their spirits like a pall, oppressed 


266 


Brown of Harvard 


him, convinced him that in justice to them, 
in fairness to himself, he owed them an 
explanation that he could not give. 

The room was dimly lighted by the 
shaded lamp on the table, casting a feeble 
glow on the heavy film of smoke that had 
settled into a well-defined layer. After 
one of his restless pacings up and down, 
he once more seated himself dejectedly 
at the desk, and seized the bunch of violets 
that Evelyn had bestowed upon him only 
a few short hours before. As he did so, the 
little vase in which they had been placed 
toppled over and fell to the floor with a 
crash. The sharp, brittle sound of break¬ 
ing glass served to arouse his companions 
from their lethargy,—even Tubby com¬ 
ing to with a final, abrupt snort, and star¬ 
ing about him in fat bewilderment. 

Madden, who had been seated opposite 
Tom with his head bowed on his arms as 
they lay folded on the desk, suddenly 
rose, walked over to the fireplace, and, 
leaning his massive shoulders against the 
mantel, coughed in a manner that was cal¬ 
culated to lend him assurance, but which 


An All-Night Session 267 

served only to call the attention of the 
others to his embarrassment, and pro¬ 
ceeded to make one of the longest, most 
coherent addresses of his career. 

“ Kid,” he began solemnly, glancing 
from time to time about the room on 
the anxious faces of his friends for sup¬ 
port and sympathy, “ Kid, I have n’t 
been asleep all this time. I’ve been 
thinking.” 

Under ordinary circumstances this re¬ 
mark would have afforded the irrepressi¬ 
ble Tubby opportunity for a facetious 
gibe, but for once he remained preterna- 
turally silent, and listened with respectful 
attention. 

“ I’ve been thinking,” continued Mad¬ 
den seriously, “ and I know that what I’ve 
said to myself is just what the other fel¬ 
lows are thinking, too. And Kid, old 
man, darn it all, I’m going to speak right 
out. Old chap,” he said, with a world of 
genuine affection in his voice, usually so 
bantering and good-natured, “ I don't 
thinkj and we all don't think, you are be¬ 
ing quite frank with us . We know you 


s68 


Brown of Harvard 


have n’t done anything wrong, but, hang 
it all, this is an ugly proposition you ’re up 
against, and I don’t think it’s right for 
you to keep anything back. Of course, 
it may seem none of our business; but, 
Kid,” and here his voice trembled slightly, 
“ we ’ve always been square and above 
board with each other, and—but—well, it 
seems you owe it not only to yourself, but 
to your friends, to clear the atmosphere. 
Why, this confounded business has given 
us all a set-back—it ’s made us all feel— 
rotten. It has even taken away the pleas¬ 
ure of our win on the river to-day. Some¬ 
how, darn it all, I don’t feel glad a little 
bit.” And then, walking over to where 
Tom sat moodily at the desk, he placed 
his hand on his chum’s arm, as a father 
might do to a beloved child, and added in 
a voice thick with the earnestness of his 
emotion, “ Oh, Tom,—it was a regular 
knock-out! ” 

The others in the room were now wide¬ 
awake, and looked at Madden approv¬ 
ingly, as if he had expressed, no matter 
how awkwardly, the sentiments common 


An All-Night Session 269 

to them all. Tom, however, remained 
seated in an attitude of despair, crushing 
the violets in his hand. 

There were a few moments of absolute 
silence, broken only by the twittering of 
the birds outside, which had already begun 
to feel the approach of early dawn, when 
Tubby, in an aggrieved tone, came to the 
rescue, and relieved the situation some¬ 
what of its embarrassment. 

“ Kid,” he said, in an injured tone, 
it’s taken my appetite away—that’s 
what it’s done. That was a bully good 
dinner to-night at the Union, and ” he add¬ 
ed forlornly, “ and I could n’t enjoy it.” 

Instead of regarding Tubby’s remarks 
in a cheerful vein, as was the custom, his 
friends apparently paid them no attention 
at all. Most of the smokers had renewed 
their pipes and sat regarding Mad¬ 
den and Tom attentively with a serious 
eye. The stillness became almost unbear¬ 
able, and in order to relieve the strain, 
Jean, who sat over on the piano stool re¬ 
clining at a perilous angle against the 
keys, turned and struck a few soft chords. 


270 


Brown of Harvard 


The music, however, seemed totally out of 
place, and, at once recognizing this cir¬ 
cumstance, he immediately gave over this 
artificial effort at injecting a little cheer 
into the situation, and wheeled apologeti¬ 
cally around upon his stool as if he had 
committed some grave offence. And, in¬ 
deed, it seemed that he had, for the others 
frowned upon him horribly. 

“ There is no use of my arguing with 
you, Tom,” continued Madden. “We 
might have argued with you hours to¬ 
night, and yet get no farther than when 
we first started. We all feel,” he added, 
as he made his way back to the friendly 
mantel-piece, looking about once more 
upon the others for support,—“ we all 
feel that—confound it, we all feel that you 
ought to speak out.” 

Tom nervously rose from his seat, 
yearning to “ speak out,” as his chum had 
suggested, and yet convinced that it was 
the last thing he could do. He took two 
or three turns up and down the room, fol¬ 
lowed by the men’s anxious glances, and 
then miserably resumed his place at the 


An All-Night Session 271 


desk while he looked around upon the 
others beseechingly. 

“ I have spoken, Clax,” he replied at 
last, pleadingly. “ I Ve told you all 
fairly that I scarcely know this girl, Miss 
Thorne—no better than most of you do. 
Why, Clax, old fellow, I don’t believe 
I Ve spoken more than a dozen sentences 
to her in my life. I met her wholly by 
accident.” 

“ I know, Kid,” replied Madden, “ we 
believe all that—we know all that; but 
there’s the check. Of course you can ex¬ 
plain all about that, but—hang it all— 
why dont you explain about it? What 
the deuce do you want to keep so mum 
about it for? What’s the use in making 
us all feel so—so-” 

“ Rotten! ” supplied the chorus of 
Tom’s friends, at the same time removing 
their pipes from their mouths and awaiting 
Tom’s reply in an agony of expectation. 

“ Why don’t you explain about the 
check, Kid?” persisted Madden, as Tom 
still hesitated to reply. 

Tom gazed at his friends imploringly. 



272 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Because,” he said, after another 
moment of embarrassed silence, while 
the men sat at attention, expecting the 
final solution of a riddle that had been 
a sore trial to all of them, “ because—I 
can t. 

There was a groan from the others, 
as they put their pipes back into their 
mouths and puffed away furiously, send¬ 
ing up great clouds of smoke. Madden 
turned his back to the room and leaned 
his elbows on the mantel in a posture of 
mute despair. 

“ Honest, Clax,” continued Tom ear¬ 
nestly, “ I can’t explain about it, even 
to my own satisfaction. I can’t explain 
about that check.” 

“ Now, look here, Tom,” spoke up 
Happy Thurston “ You ’re not acting 
right. I—I know you’ve been a little 
sore at me because I used to cut in on you 
with her, but she, she never cared a hang 
for me. You were always the main guy 
there, and you know it. So it does n’t 
seem right to me that you should let her 
look cheap that way before all the fellows 
•—sort of playing fast and loose, as if you 


An All-Night Session 273 

did n’t appreciate what a devil of a fine 
thing it was to be ‘ Number 1 ’ with a 
girl like—well, I’m not mentioning any 
names.” 

So much from Happy. The others lis¬ 
tened to his frank address with manifest 
admiration, and then turned once more 
toward Tom, who had sunk down in his 
chair until his head rested on the back, 
looking, if possible, more hopelessly de¬ 
jected than ever. To Thurston’s appeal 
he remained silent. 

“And then too,” observed Tubby ear¬ 
nestly, coming gracefully to the aid of his 
friends with his usual tact, “ how about 
that day in your room, Kid ? That April 
Fools’ day when you worked off your 
beautiful gag on us? Gee, that was a 
corker! I’m not asking what that girl 
was doing there—in your own room you 
know. That’s your own business, but it 
seems to me as if—well, as if you ought n’t 
to deny that you must have known her 
pretty well.” 

A look of pain spread over Tom’s face, 
and Madden wheeled sharply about from 
his station at the mantel. 

18 


274 Brown of Harvard 

“ Tubby Anderson,” he exclaimed in¬ 
dignantly, “ you ’re the confoundedest 
idiot that the Lord ever let loose. Now 
you just dry up. The Kid told us that 
everything w r as right about the girl and 
you know he does n’t lie. There’s some¬ 
thing in this business that we don’t under¬ 
stand, I ’ll admit, but that April Fools’ 
day thing is not what’s worrying us. It’s 
the check.” And then turning to Tom 
he added, almost pleadingly, “ If you had 
lent that money to Miss Th—to the girl, 
Tom—you’d tell, would n’t you, old man? 
There would n’t be any harm in that, now, 
would there? ” 

Tom abruptly drew himself up in his 
chair and glared at his tormentors in sud¬ 
den desperation. 

“ Hang it all, Clax,” he said impa¬ 
tiently, “ we ought to have gone to bed 
hours ago. It’s a rank shame to sit up 
this way, and besides there’s no use going 
into that thing any more. I tell you, I 
cant explain. Don’t you know what that 
means? I can't explain. I don’t want to 
talk any more about it! ” Whereupon 



'an't explain. I don’t want to talk any more about it!” 









































1 


f 


<- 





































I 



. 


V 






/ 




















An All-Night Session 275 

he jumped from his seat, and began for 
the twentieth time his nervous pacing up 
and down the room. 

Madden followed him sadly for a mo¬ 
ment with his eyes, and then slowly picked 
up the check from the table and gazed at 
it mournfully,—the fatal cause of all the 
solicitude of his friends and himself. 

“ It says 4 to bearer,’ ” he sighed, 44 4 Pay 
to bearer.’ ” 

He felt the check, turned it over, held 
it up to the lamp, in the vain hope that in 
some mysterious way the secret would be 
revealed. But as no new light broke in 
upon him, he passed the slip on to Ber¬ 
nard. The latter went through the same 
fruitless pantomime, and the check was 
passed about among the men until finally 
it came into the possession of Thurston, 
who retained it, and studied it even more 
critically than the others had done. 

44 Did she strike you for a loan, Kid? ” 
inquired Madden, still seeking for some 
loop-hole through which his chum could 
make his escape. 

44 No! No! Of course not,” returned 


276 


Brown of Harvard 


Tom hotly. “ I tell you I scarcely know 
the girl. The idea of her striking me for 
a loan—why it’s ridiculous! ” 

“ Kid,” said Jean seriously, for the first 
time taking an active part in the proceed¬ 
ings, though with a certain air of diffi¬ 
dence, “ I was hoping I would n’t have to 
say anything about this, but I want to 
force your hand. I saw you myself one 
night, a couple of weeks ago, in the yard, 
right outside my window talking to that 
girl, and her brother, Thorne, came along 
and kicked up an awful muss about some 
violets or something, and—well—it was 
none of my business, of course, and I’d 
never have thought of it again if it had n’t 
been for this that’s happened. You did 
give her something then, Kid,—now 
didn’t you, old man?” 

Again the men observed Tom keenly. 
It certainly seemed now that they were on 
a promising trail. 

“ Yes,” replied Tom briefly, with a 
slight return of the familiar good-humored 
twinkle in his eyes. 

“What was it, Kid?” continued Jean 


An All-Night Session 277 

eagerly. “ Of course, it’s none of my 
business, as I said, but—hang it—what 
was it? ” 

The men remained breathless, awaiting 
Tom’s reply with absorbed interest. 

“A bunch of violets,” responded Tom 
simply. 

There was a sigh of disappointment, 
almost of vexation, from his friends. They 
had begun to realize that the inquiry was 
hopeless. One by one they resumed their 
former places, and succumbing to the de¬ 
mands of exhausted nature, they once 
more faded away into the sweet oblivion 
of slumber. Even Tom, worn out by the 
physical exertion of the race, by the gruel¬ 
ling if kindly intended inquisition to 
which he had been subjected by his friends, 
by the extreme lateness of the hour, sank 
back into the arm-chair, and, resting his 
head on his breast, was soon lost in an in¬ 
nocent, peaceful, profound sleep. And 
thus they dozed on, while Tubby renewed 
his stertorous snoring on the window-seat, 
while the lamp continued to emit its murky 
smoke, while the remnant of night waned 


278 Brown of Harvard 

and gave place to the approach of a 
gorgeous spring dawn, while the birds in 
the big tree on the sidewalk renewed their 
incessant, multitudinous chirping, while 
the world without awoke to the life and 
noise and activity of another day. 

They slept—all except Mr. Happy 
Thurston. As for him, he appeared to be 
entranced by the slip of paper that he 
held in his hand. For a long time he 
scrutinized it without stirring, examining 
every feature of it—the printing, the date, 
the amount for which it called, the words 
that Madden had quoted, “ Payable to 
bearer,” and, with especial intentness, the 
signature. 

The birds were very busy in the tree 
now; there was the occasional rattle of 
an unreasonably early cart or wagon on 
the street; the light of the rising sun 
crept around the edges of the drawn 
window-shade, and, partly illuminating 
the room, served to reduce the already 
feeble rays of the lamp to a weird, ghostly 
pallor. 

At length Happy raised his head and 


An All-Night Session 279 

glanced about on his unconscious com¬ 
panions, studying each of them intently— 
craftily. Then he arose noiselessly, and 
made his way with cunning stealth over to 
the desk. Pulling out the upper drawer 
he rummaged about among the jumble of 
papers that it contained, and, selecting a 
few that apparently answered his purpose, 
seated himself in the chair formerly oc¬ 
cupied by Tom, and, placing the check on 
the desk, began a minute, searching com¬ 
parison between the signature and those 
on several scraps of paper that he had 
taken from the drawer. 

For fully ten minutes he remained en¬ 
grossed in this occupation, from time to 
time glancing furtively about upon his 
somnolent comrades, when suddenly there 
came a brisk rapping on the door. Tom, 
roused from his repose, opened his eyes 
and glanced about the room. Again there 
came the sound of knocking, this time 
louder than before. The other sleepers, 
excepting Tubby, who was entirely too 
far gone to be disturbed by any such 


28 o 


Brown of Harvard 


slight interruption as this, stirred unea¬ 
sily in their places, and drowsily came back 
to earth when Tom called out: 

“ Come in! ” 

The door opened, and Wilton Ames, 
haggard and worn, stood on the threshold. 
Glancing about the room and observing 
the men stretched out in attitudes of more 
or less picturesque repose, and eying him 
with marked curiosity, he stammered: 

“ Oh—Kid, I—I thought you were 
alone.” 

“ Come in,” said Tom endeavoring with¬ 
out success to adopt his customary hearty 
manner, “ glad to see you. What on earth 
are you doing up this time of night? ” 

Ames closed the door hesitatingly be¬ 
hind him, and shuffled awkwardly into the 
room, still glancing furtively about. 

“ You look fagged,” observed Tom 
dryly. “ Have a drink? ” 

“ I ’ve been up all night too,” said Ames 
feebly. “ I—I could n’t sleep.” 

“ I’ve given all my friends a bad night, 
it seems,” said Tom in a tone which, 


An All-Night Session 281 


strangely enough for him, was fraught 
with a very obvious quality of irony. 

He stepped over to the little buffet in 
the corner and taking down a glass poured 
into it a stiff drink of whiskey, diluting it 
with a squirt of seltzer from a siphon on 
the table. 

“ Come,” he said with an effort of good 
cheer, handing the glass to Ames, who 
had sunk despondently on the window-seat 
in a small space left vacant by the still 
snoring Tubby, “ brace up. You Ve no¬ 
thing to—er—you should n’t feel so cut 
up, old man. Come, take a drink, and be 
cheerful! ” 

Ames took the proffered glass, and held 
it is his hand without attempting to taste 
its contents,—looking all the while cov¬ 
ertly, suspiciously, about the room. 

Tom stepped over to the window and 
with a dexterous twitch sent the blind up 
with a snap. Instantaneously a gleam 
of sunshine flooded the apartment with 
the glorious red of the awakening day. 

The sudden influx of brilliant light, 
compared with the dull glow of the jaded 


282 


Brown of Harvard 


lamp, had a fairly dazzling effect, and 
served to rouse even the snoring Tubby to 
a state of consciousness. 

“ Why! ” he exclaimed, sitting up in his 
place and rubbing his round eyes in amaze¬ 
ment, “ it’s—it’s morning! Gee! We Ve 
sat up all night!” And then, looking 
about upon the others, not noticing the 
presence of the new arrival, he added, 
as if moved by a sudden, happy inspira¬ 
tion: 

“ Say, let’s all go down to Rammy’s, 
and get a hot dog! ” 

But here a most untoward incident oc¬ 
curred. For Thurston, his eyes still glued 
on the paper before him, suddenly sprang 
from his seat, and shouted, in a tone of 
triumph: 

“ I’ve got it! I’ve got it! ” 

“ Got what? ” inquired Madden. 

“ I’ve got it; oh, I’ve got it! ” rushed 
on Happy precipitately. “ The check— 
Tom’s check for three hundred dollars, 
—it’s a forgery !" 

Ames’s glass, with its untasted contents, 
fell to the floor with a crash. His hand 


An All-Night Session 283 

trembled violently, and his face became 
ghastly pale. 

Tom stepped up to him and placed his 
hand on his shoulder as if to steady him, 
at the same time remarking: 

“ You need n’t yell so all-fired loud, 
Happy. There’s no use going up in the 
air about this thing.” 

But the others paid him no attention. 
They were staring in astonishment, while 
the sinister import of Thurston’s words 
filtered through their torpid intellects. 

“ Why, Happy,” exclaimed Madden at 
last, when once the full force of the situa¬ 
tion had dawned upon him, and gazing 
wonderingly to where Ames sat, “ are you 
sure—how do you know? ” 

“ Know? ” repeated Thurston with the 
exultant triumph of one who has solved 
an apparently hopeless riddle, “know? 
Why, because I’ve been working at this 
thing in a common-sense way, while you 
lobsters have been snoozing. Just look 
here,” he said, “ and compare this signa¬ 
ture on the check with Tom’s signature on 
these theme papers.” 


284 Brown of Harvard 

The men began to crowd about Thurs¬ 
ton, eager for a confirmation of his dis¬ 
covery, when Tom sprang forward from 
Ames’s side and snatched the check from 
Thurston’s grasp. 

“ Now look here, you fellows,” he 
cried, “ just drop this right here. Why 
on earth can’t you let this check alone? 
It’s none of your affair, anyhow, and— 
and you ’re all a darned lot of busy-bodies, 
butting in where you’ve no right to! ” 

“ I know, Kid,” returned Madden 
quietly, “ but, Tom, if it is a forgery, why, 
you know, that lets you out—and we ’ll 
—we ’ll all feel so much better-” 

Before Madden could finish there came 
a loud rap on the door, which was imme¬ 
diately thrown open violently, and Cart- 
right, bespectacled and shrimp-like as of 
yore, burst precipitately into the room. 

“ For God’s sake, Brown,” he cried, his 
large, near-sighted eyes almost popping 
from their sockets with excitement, 
“ you’ve got to get away from here— 
quick! I’ve done all I could. I’ve spent 
the whole night with him, arguing and 



An All-Night Session 285 

persuading, but he’s wild and won’t listen 
to reason. Thorne—hang it,” he added, 
his excitement increased by Tom’s imper- 
turbed, almost serene aspect, “ Thorne, 
do you hear? That crazy grind from the 
South! He’s coming here with a gun 
and—oh, confound it all,—don’t you un¬ 
derstand?—he means murder! ” 

There was a pause while the others in 
the room gazed from Cartright to Tom in 
helpless dismay. 

“ I tell you the fellow’s crazed—wild! ” 
—rushed on Cartright, now thoroughly 
exasperated as well as excited, “ do you 
know what I mean? He ’ll shoot on 
sight. Don’t —dont stand there like— 
like a frozen Indian! ” 

A smile, almost of sweet content, spread 
over Tom’s features, for somehow, even 
though the peril might be, as Cartright 
had said, imminent and grave, he felt a 
strange sense of relief, and with a return 
to his accustomed drawl, he asked: 

“ Well, what do you expect me to do, 
old man? Run up the chimney? ” 


CHAPTER XIX 

THE WORM TURNS 

H ARDLY had Tom finished speak¬ 
ing when there was the trampling 
of rapid steps on the staircase and in the 
hall, and Thorne, the unfortunate, more 
desperate, wilder, more frenzied than ever, 
stood in the doorway. He stopped for a 
moment, apparently surprised by the 
gathering of students in the room, but 
catching sight of Tom, who still remained 
in a wholly unconcerned attitude by the 
desk, he rushed toward him with an oath. 

Claxton, however, sprang forward and 
interposed his bulky form between the 
maddened Southerner and his complacent 
prey. 

“ Look here, Thorne,” he cried, “ what 
the devil do you mean by coming in here 
like this? Just cut this out, will you? 

286 


The Worm Turns 287 

We’ve had enough of this stage villain 
business for one day.” 

“ Cut it out, eh? ” sneered Thorne, 
“ not until I ’ve had an understanding 
with that scoundrel. There are no women 
here now, and we ’ll have this thing settled 
once for all!” 

Here Tom, who still appeared to be the 
most collected man in the room, stepped 
forward, and placing his hand on his 
chum’s shoulder, pushed him gently aside. 

“ You stand back, Clax. This is my 
row, and I guess I can take care of my¬ 
self.” Then, turning to Thorne, he 
continued: 

“ Thorne, you ’re rattled;—you believe 
that I have in some way mortally offended 
you;—you’ve come around here to give 
me hell;—there has even been some talk 
about your having a gun so that you can 
do me up in real, first-class Southern style. 
But before you go a step farther in this 
matter, knowing that you might, if you 
wished, shoot me dead in a moment, I 
swear to you by all that’s holy that I’m 
not guilty of what you have accused me.” 


288 


Brown of Harvard 


“ The money,” cried Thorne passion¬ 
ately, “ why did you give my sister 
money? ” 

Tom looked the crazed stroke-oar 
steadily in the eye, and, speaking deliber¬ 
ately, impressively, replied: 

ff I gave your sister no money !" 

“Ah—but you gave her a check! You 
dare quibble with me? You ’re a liar and 
a scoundrel, and I’m going to treat you 
as we treat men of your stamp down in 
my country.” 

He made a movement with his clinched 
fist toward his pocket, but Madden again 
jumped forward and caught him by the 
wrist, while Cartright darted to his side 
and placed a trembling hand on his 
shoulder. 

“ Stop, Thorne! For heaven’s sake 
stop! This—this is the man whose money 
is helping you through college !" 

The words struck Thorne like a blow. 
It seemed as if he had suddenly become 
paralyzed. He stared at Cartright in 
dumb amazement, unable to believe the 
evidence of his senses. From Cartright 


The Worm Turns 


289 


he slowly transferred his gaze to Tom, 
whose face had suddenly flushed a furious 
red. There was a moment of intense si¬ 
lence, the men forming a dramatic group 
in the centre of the room, with the excep¬ 
tion of Ames, who had shrunk back to the 
corner. 

" He !" at length uttered Thorne 
hoarsely,—almost in a whisper, “ that 
purse-proud snob; he, of all men in the 
world—help me! I have been living in 
comfort, in luxury, through him! Why! ” 
he shouted passionately, as if the truth 
had suddenly dawned upon him, “ it was 
blood money!” 

“ Oh,” said Tom horrified, “ don’t say 
that.” 

“ It was blood money! A brother paid 
a price for his sister! May God take 
from me every particle of knowledge I 
have gained from his hands! May my 
brain be withered-” 

“ Hush! ” shouted Tom, his manner ab¬ 
ruptly changing from complacent self- 
restraint to an intense earnestness that 
developed quickly into a passion as violent 



290 


Brown of Harvard 


as that of his accuser. “ You don’t know 
what you’re saying! Stop!” he ex¬ 
claimed as Thorne was about to speak 
again. “Not a word! Now, you listen 
to me ,—all of you listen to me. I’m 
tired of being bullied. I J m going to 
speak now, and you’ve all got to believe 
what I say. You’ve all been sitting in 
judgment on me; you, all my best friends! 
You’ve doubted me, and I know it. 
You’ve been harping on that damned 
check until you’ve nearly driven me crazy. 
Now, I don’t want to pass myself any 
bouquets, but I’ve never done a dishonor¬ 
able act in my life; my record’s clean. 
I’ve never done a low trick to any of you, 
nor to anybody else, and you’ve got to be¬ 
lieve what I say, and you’ve got to stop 
questioning me, and you’ve got to leave 
me alone. You, Clax, who ought to 
know better, and you, Thorne, and all the 
rest of you, listen to me! I tell you once 
for all that I had nothing whatever to do 
with this thing of which I’m accused. You 
hear that?—absolutely nothing whatever. 
I’m as innocent as any man in this room. 


The Worm Turns 291 

I *m not going to say another word on the 
subject; I’m not going to explain any¬ 
thing, or account for anythng, or give 
any reasons to anybody, but every man in 
this room has got to believe me or, dam¬ 
nation and hell,”—and here Tom, in the 
fervor of his excitement tearing his coat 
off with a melodramatic flourish, cast it 
on the floor, and rolled up his sleeves— 
“ I ’ll fight the whole crowd of you! ” 

It was an involuntary resort to youth¬ 
ful, primeval methods, but Tom’s speech 
was so obviously genuine, his manner so 
clearly that of one w T ho felt bitterly and 
spoke the truth, that his little audience was 
visibly affected. The primitive emotions 
may be crude, but their very crudity lends 
them strength. This sudden, violent out¬ 
burst of indignation, of resentment, of a 
righteous protest long repressed, was de¬ 
livered with telling effect and swept all 
before it. Even Thorne, angry, grieved, 
frenzied though he was, could not fail to 
be strongly impressed. This “ purse- 
proud snob,” as he had fleeringly dubbed 
him, was in earnest,—he was telling the 


292 Brown of Harvard 

truth,—he felt convinced that there could 
be no doubt of that. 

For a few moments Thorne stood gaz¬ 
ing at the impassioned, coatless Tom while 
the turmoil in his own soul gradually, al¬ 
most reluctantly, subsided. And then, his 
innate manhood and sense of justice com¬ 
ing to the surface, he muttered, in his 
usual deep, solemn voice with something 
of a return to his old diffident manner: 

“ I—I do not know what to think. If 
I have accused you unfairly—you—you 
must forgive me. My sister denies it was 
you; it is only right for me to say that.” 

He stopped and sternly scrutinized the 
face of each man in the room, his gaze at 
last resting on Ames who still remained, 
crushed and motionless, in the corner. 
For a long time Thorne stood studying 
him in silence, and then he moved slowly 
over toward the door. 

When he had reached the threshold he 
turned and once more faced the little knot 
gathered about Tom in the centre of the 
room. 

“As to your helping me with money. 


The Worm Turns 


293 


Brown,” he said, “ we shall settle that at 
another time. Cartright there will tell 
you that I did all in my power to learn who 
my benefactor was, without success. In 
regard to the other matter—I may have 
made an ass of myself, though God knows 
I had every reason to suspect you and to 
hate you. But,” and here again his 
glance rested on the miserable, huddled 
form of Ames, “ but—I will wait.” 

After he had gone there was a concerted 
sigh of relief from Tom’s friends. Mad¬ 
den picked the coat up from the floor and 
held it out to his chum. 

“ Come, Kid,” he said, “ put this on— 
you ’ll catch cold. And,” he added seri¬ 
ously, “ there’s no reason why you should 
lick us all in a bunch, old man. You ’re 
wrong when you say we doubted you. We 
did n’t doubt you, we merely wanted to 
know, that’s all. We believe every word 
you said, and as for the check, why, I say,” 
and here he, in his turn, cast a furtive 
glance toward Ames, “ we ’ll let it drop. 
We ’ll let it drop, fellows, won’t we? ” 

“ Sure thing! ” was the hearty response. 


294 Brown of Harvard 

“ More than that,” went on Madden 
earnestly, “ I think I can promise on be¬ 
half of all of us, that not a word of this 
business will get beyond this room, at least 
as far as we are concerned.” 

There was murmur of hearty assent to 
this proposition, whereupon the tension 
of the situation was further relieved by 
Tubby, who exclaimed peevishly, forget¬ 
ting the rather unfortunate part he had 
himself taken in the inquisition some time 
before: 

“ What I say is, if we’d only cut out all 
this hot air and hysterics and gone down 
to Hammy’s for some coffee and a big hot 
dog, we’d all have felt better. Come on, 
fellows, let’s go now.” 

There was a general movement toward 
the door, the men passing out one by one 
in silence, including Madden and Cart- 
right. As they filed out Ames rose from 
his seat and was about to follow them, but 
Tom quietly touched him on the arm and 
motioned him to stay. 


CHAPTER XX 


THE RECOVERY OF WILTON AMES 

ELL,” muttered Ames sullenly, as 



he sank into a chair, while Tom 


closed the door on his departing guests, 
“ what do you want? What are you go¬ 
ing to do?” 

Tom, making no immediate reply, 
walked over to the desk, picked up the 
check, and stood facing his companion 
with a look, half of pity, half of contempt. 
For a minute—a minute that seemed an 
age to the wretched Ames, the two re¬ 
garded each other in silence. 

For the first time in his life Tom felt 
himself called upon to act as censor, and 
the role was so strange, so unsuited to his 
boyish, unsuspecting nature that he found 
it extremely awkward to make a begin¬ 
ning. Moreover, the fact that this young 


296 


Brown of Harvard 


man was the brother of the girl whom he 
loved so fondly made the task infinitely 
more difficult. It seemed impossible that 
Evelyn could be the sister of this man— 
Evelyn so innocent, so girlish, so ingenu¬ 
ous, and Wilton so deceitful, so weak, so 
utterly without principle. And yet even 
Tom in his inexperience was aware that 
those apparent paradoxes were not at all 
uncommon; the same stem may bear two 
flowers,—one sweet and perfect and pure; 
the other mean and shrunken and un¬ 
beautiful. So much may be due to the 
withering blight of circumstances and 
environment. 

“ Wilton,” he said presently, summon¬ 
ing up his resolution and speaking in a 
tone that was ominously solemn, “ I hardly 
know what to say to you, for I don’t be¬ 
lieve we understand the same language. 
Don’t mistake me in this matter. I am 
not angry with you. I’m not going to 
scold you. I’m sorry for you—for I be¬ 
lieve you have been duped and at the 
mercy of that snake Colton. But I’m 
more sorry for your mother, and for your 


Recovery of Wilton Ames 297 

sister, and—I’m destroying this bit of 
paper, not only for your sake, but especi¬ 
ally for theirs.” 

He picked up the check and held it over 
the chimney of the still lighted lamp. In 
a moment, with a tiny explosion, it sprang 
into a blaze, and he turned it one w r ay and 
the other so that it might burn the more 
freely, while it writhed and crackled and 
rustled, little black flakes fluttering off 
from time to time and dropping noiselessly 
down upon the desk. 

“ There,” he said, when the check had 
been entirely consumed, “ that is wiped 
out. A T o one will have a chance to study 
the—my signature again. I don’t ask 
why you did it, Wilton; I don’t care. 
That is all past and gone now. But 
there is one thing that I do ask, and in¬ 
sist upon knowing, and that is, what are 
you going to do about the girl? " 

“ Tom,” replied Ames, resorting to his 
characteristic whine, “ I—I know it was 
a low-down thing about that check. I— 
I was hard pressed, and, well, Colton—he 
made me-*” 



298 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Never mind about the check, or about 
Colton,” returned Tom brusquely, “ the 
thing is—what are you going to do about 
the girl—Miss Thorne?” 

“ Oh, Kid,” pleaded Ames, “ you 
must n’t be too hard on me about the girl. 
I—I love her, of course—I do indeed,” he 
said, with a faint spark of earnestness in 
his voice, though he at once returned to his 
old cringing manner, “ but, you know, 
Kid, I am dreadfully poor—I—I ” and 
here he halted miserably. 

“ That’s all very well, Wilton,” per¬ 
sisted Tom, “ but what I want to know is 
—what are you going to do about her? 
In plain words, are you going to turn her 
down or not? You have got her to be¬ 
lieve in you—she was willing and ready to 
go away for your sake. Now, I repeat, 
are you going to act like a gentleman or 
a scoundrel? ” 

“ Oh, Kid,” replied Ames pleadingly, 
“ I don’t see why you have to be so fierce 
about it. You know I’m deucedly poor. 
Other fellows would do just as I have 
done--” 


Recovery of Wilton Ames 299 

“Other fellows!” broke in Tom, now 
fairly stirred to a passion of indignation. 
“ What sort of fellows are you talking 
about, anyway? Why, let me tell you, 
Ames, I’m no preacher, but if a girl, a 
young, sweet, confiding girl, such as Miss 
Thorne is, should think enough of me to 
put her love for me above all things in the 
world, banking on me alone for happi¬ 
ness, I’d stick to that girl through every¬ 
thing, for I’d know that she loved me— 
me , do you understand, and not anything 
she might gain by belonging to me, and 
we can’t always be sure of that much even 
in the carefully proper women we marry! 
You ’re ashamed about that check, be¬ 
cause the rotten standards of society have 
made it a worse thing for a so-called gen¬ 
tleman to steal money than to trifle with a 
sweet, pure girl’s affections. Why, Wil¬ 
ton, I don’t care a continental about that 
check,—but, confound it all, man, I do 
care about that girl. I’ve seen her, I 
know what she is. I know of her devotion 
to you, of her whole-hearted, unselfish 
affection, and I tell you, that girl with 


300 


Brown of Harvard 


her love, her tenderness, her sympathy, is 
a queen! She’s too good to be thrown 
down, especially by such a two-spot as 
you!” 

“ Oh, come, Kid,” said Ames weakly, 
“ you ’re rubbing it in rather strong. 
Hang it all,—Marian—Miss Thorne, is 
everything to me—but, Tom, I must have 
time, I must have-” 

Ames stopped short on hearing a sharp 
knocking at the door. Before Tom, who 
was in no mood for an interruption, could 
collect himself sufficiently to utter the con¬ 
ventional “ Come in,” the door opened, 
and Mrs. Ames entered, evidently in a 
state of extreme agitation. On seeing 
her son she stopped in surprise. 

“ Why, Wilton,” she exclaimed, “ I 
did n’t expect to find you here. Tom—I 
presume Wilton has come to you on the 
same errand which brings me here. You 
must excuse me, Tom, for intruding on 
your privacy, but I felt that our relations 
were such that I must come and have a 
talk with you.” 

“ Come in, Mrs. Ames, you are always 



Recovery of Wilton Ames 301 

welcome, of course,” replied Tom with a 
somewhat forced attempt at hospitality, 
and at the same time with a very much 
puzzled countenance. 

“ Oh, Tom,” cried Mrs. Ames, as she 
sank into the chair he offered her, “ I 
could n’t sleep last night for thinking of 
that poor girl. I went to her in her room 
after the race.” 

The men started and gazed at each other 
in astonishment. 

“ What,” exclaimed Tom in dismay, 
“ you went to her rooms,—to Miss 
Thorne’s rooms? ” 

“ Yes, I did. I simply could n’t do 
otherwise under the circumstances. I 
could n’t bear to think of her alone, with 
no woman to sympathize with her—with 
no companion except that brutal, tyranni¬ 
cal brother. And since I’ve seen what 
sort of a girl she is, I’ve come to you to 
ask that you keep your promise with her 
and be the man—the honorable, upright 
man that I’ve always thought you to be.” 

“Keep my promise to her!” repeated 
Tom blankly. 


302 


Brown of Harvard 


“ Oh, Tom,” continued Mrs. Ames in a 
voice full of bitter reproach, “ how could 
you act like this—so treacherously—so 
unworthily of yourself, when you knew 
we all loved you and believed in you! 
How could you have broken our hearts! 
To think that you could have trifled so 
with poor Evelyn, that you could have ut¬ 
terly destroyed all her girlish ideals! It 
is so cruel, so base—I can hardly believe 
it. But it was even worse in you to treat 
Miss Thorne as you did;—to send her 
money privately, and arrange to have her 
leave with you; to raise her hopes, and win 
her affection and her trust, and then at 
last, to desert her. Oh, Tom, Tom, it 
was n’t worthy of you—it was n’t worthy 
of you.” 

During Mrs. Ames’s castigation Tom 
had stood, dumb with a conflict of emo¬ 
tions. He knew not what to say, what to 
think,—he did not even know what to feel. 

But with the last accusing words that 
were spoken, Wilton, with a cry of ago¬ 
nized protest, suddenly dropped on his 
knees at his mother’s side and buried his 


Recovery of Wilton Ames 303 

face in her lap, sobbing passionately. 
The tide had turned at last. His better 
self, so long repressed, so long submerged 
by circumstance, by Fate, by his own 
weakness, now finally asserted itself in a 
complete, an overwhelming torrent of 
confession. 

“ Oh, mother,” he cried convulsively, 
“ stop—you must not say another word 
against Tom. He has been noble and 
kind and generous, and everybody has 
blamed him. It was not Tom, mother! 
It was not Tom who sent the check—it 
was I. Oh, mother dear, can you ever for¬ 
give me? I have been all that you have 
said of Tom,—base, and mean, and low, 
and wicked—but,—but it was not Tom; 
it was all my fault, I am the only one to 
blame! ” 

And while the son laid bare the wounds 
and scars of his soul; while the mother 
bore these cruel cuts and lashings to her 
mother’s heart as only a mother can, Tom, 
with a hot stinging in his eyes that he en¬ 
deavored vainly to wink away, stepped 
softly from the room and, closing the door 


304 


Brown of Harvard 


tenderly, almost reverently behind him, 
walked quietly—more quietly than he had 
ever done before—down the staircase, and 
into the free, glad, wholesome, sinless air 
of out-of-doors. 


CHAPTER XXI 


WHY TUBBY WAS LONESOME 

F OR some strange reason Class Day 
afternoon was a dreary occasion 
for Tubby Anderson. His usually re¬ 
liable good spirits had deserted him, and 
he wandered about aimlessly from place 
to place, endeavoring vainly to seek solace 
in the various kinds of entertainment pro¬ 
vided by the committees of the graduating 
class. One cause for his loneliness was 
that a number of his most intimate friends 
had gone down to Red Top with the crew 
and substitutes weeks before in prepara¬ 
tion for the Yale race. Madden and 
Tom, it is true, were not included in this 
fortunate category, Madden having been 
detained for certain reasons connected 
with the science of astronomy, which an 
unreasonable faculty had deemed of 


306 Brown of Harvard 

greater importance than rowing on a pos¬ 
sibly victorious crew in the great aquatic 
event of the year. Tom had likewise been 
persuaded to remain in order to make up 
certain deficiencies concerned with the ele¬ 
vating, engrossing pursuit of crypto- 
gamic botany. But, though Tubby 
spent the greater part of the afternoon 
searching for these two devoted chums, his 
quest was singularly unfruitful. In some 
unaccountable way they had apparently 
disappeared from the face of the earth. 

His miserable cap and gown—somehow 
he felt like a rank hypocrite in that cap 
and gown—enveloped his person and 
topped his cranium all the day, imparting 
about as much energy and enthusiasm as 
the hot room of a Turkish bath. He had 
missed his customary satisfying slumber 
the night before, on account of the much 
prolonged senior spread in the Delta. 
He had had absolutely no dinner that 
evening—why, nobody could have ex¬ 
plained, except that he had simply been 
one of the unfortunates who never find 
time or place to dine (even provided they 


Why Tubby was Lonesome 307 

have the appetite or inclination), on that 
strenuous occasion. 

At night the Yard, from Johnston Gate 
to President Eliot’s house, from the Ap¬ 
pleton Chapel to Gore Hall, was cast into 
a thousand fantastic, convenient shadows, 
by chain after chain of many-colored Jap¬ 
anese lanterns strung from elm to elm, 
with the accompanying illusion of miles 
upon miles of these Oriental festoons. The 
brilliant glare in front of University Hall 
threw the great body of the old quadrangle 
into a soft, palpable, soothing shadow. 
In front of this old seat of administration, 
lighting up the beautiful, classic white 
facade of the building, flared seven bronze 
torches of heroic size—spouts of brilliant 
gas flame, flickering uncertainly in the 
gentle breezes of the June night. Above 
them, against the white stone of the Hall 
in tiny jets of light, were outlined the 
numerals of the year of Grace in which 
Tubby was graduating. 

Turning dejectedly away he meandered 
over toward the granite buttresses of Gore 
Hall, and as he approached the building 


308 


Brown of Harvard 


his manner underwent a sudden change 
and the gloom of his chubby countenance 
was replaced by a cheerful glow. For, 
in the shadows of the protecting wing of 
the building, he caught sight of what 
seemed to be the familiar figure of the 
long sought for Jean, seated on a camp- 
chair. Yes, sure enough, it was his 
strangely missing friend, but, as he drew 
still nearer, he observed, somewhat to his 
confusion, that the sweet singer was not 
alone. Despite the shadows that lurked 
in the angle of the building, it was now 
easy to detect that there was a vision in 
white by his friend’s side—very, very much 
by his side. 

Tubby hesitated. Under no circum¬ 
stance was he ever very “ keen ” for 
women’s society, and to-night he felt es¬ 
pecially averse to it. But his very natural 
masculine curiosity, added to his longing 
for some kind of company, even though 
it did involve a member of the fair sex, 
impelled him onward, and he approached 
for a nearer inspection. Much to his sur¬ 
prise, he observed that Jean’s companion 


Why Tubby was Lonesome 309 


was none other than the pretty sister of his 
friend’s “ grind,”—looking even prettier, 
more bewitching than ever in her frock 
of white, her large, graceful hat,—her fig¬ 
ure set in delicate, soft relief by the shad¬ 
owy nimbus that hovered in the secluded 
angle of the library. 

“ Oh—beg pardon,” announced Tubby, 
with cheerful embarrassment, as he re¬ 
moved his cap,—“ Miss—Miss Skimpy— 
that is, Miss—Miss -——” 

But here he was forced to haul up short, 
for he could n’t to save his life remember 
the young woman’s last name. It was she 
who came generously to the rescue. 

“ ‘ MacLea,’ ” she said, smiling sweetly. 
“ How do you do, Mr. Anderson? ” 

“ Oh, first rate—fine! ” replied Tubby, 
not looking the part by any means. 
“ Er—er—by the way, Jean, are n’t you 
going to sing with the Glee Club, old 
man? ” 

Jean looked around upon his friend sus¬ 
piciously. He had no particular fear of 
Tubby, but a Senior is very apt to cling 
strongly to his prerogative on Class Day 



3io 


Brown of Harvard 


night, especially when that prerogative 
constitutes the maiden of his dreams. 

“ No, I’m not going to sing,” he replied 
shortly. “ Let the Juniors have their 
innings—they can take care of it.” 

There was a moment of awkward si¬ 
lence, during which Tubby fumbled his 
cap in the futile search for an inspiration. 
In the end he had to give it up, however, 
and as Jean cruelly turned his back on 
him, he withdrew with a mumbled apol¬ 
ogy, narrowly escaping an upset over an 
unsuspected camp-chair in his rear. 

Once well out of ear-shot, he murmured 
in a tone calculated to soothe his injured 
pride: 

“Fussing! Always fussing! The 
whole business is one big fussing match. 
Oh, gee, if I could only get some of the 
fellows and go over to Rammy’s for a hot 
dog!” 

He wandered past Gore Hall, once more 
entering the soft, varicolored gleam of 
Japanese lanterns, and, being caught up 
in the current, was swept along in the 
maze of those surging toward the Union 


Why Tubby was Lonesome 311 

and Beck Hall spreads, across Quincy 
Street. 

Entering Beck Hall, he passed out 
through the door at the back and found 
himself in a large court-yard in which an¬ 
other section of the Class Day throng were 
seated at tables. At one end of the en¬ 
closure was a temporary dance pavilion, 
while a tent, open on all sides, had been 
erected over in the corner along Harvard 
Street. 

Threading his way among the tables and 
standing groups Tubby proceeded to a 
certain space on the left, where a number 
of old grads and a few under-classmen 
were devoting themselves to a bowl of 
punch. 

It was good punch, very good punch, 
and Tubby addressed himself tem¬ 
porarily to the submersion of his sorrows. 
Then brushing through a grove of potted 
palms and stumbling ungracefully over 
another upset camp-chair, he landed 
on the dancing pavilion and for a few 
moments miserably attached himself to 
the fringe of stag onlookers that stood 


312 


Brown of Harvard 


aimlessly on the outskirts. In vain did 
he scan the happy, laughing crowd of 
dancers for a glimpse of his friends. 
Jean had already been accounted for. 
But—where were the rest? Where, es¬ 
pecially, were Tom and Madden? 

As he slowly revolved these matters in 
his mind he made his way, without pur¬ 
pose, to a far corner of the enclosure, and 
there, as if in answer to his troubled ques¬ 
tion, in eager converse, he beheld Madden 
and Edith seated at a table, bending to¬ 
ward each other in true Class Day absorp¬ 
tion, oblivious, regardless of the outside 
world, knowing only one world—that 
world peopled, and very plentifully peo¬ 
pled, by themselves. 

Instantly Tubby felt a return of his 
wonted spirits. There was the usual, sig¬ 
nificant vacant chair at Madden’s table, 
indicating that the chaperon had provi¬ 
dentially vanished as is the habit of the 
best regulated chaperons. He would 
join them, occupy the chair, and make up 
for some of the doleful hours he had spent 
that wretched night. Stepping forward 


Why Tubby was Lonesome 3 J 3 

gleefully, he gave Madden a resounding 
thump on the back. 

“ Hello, Clax, old man! Hello, Edith! 
I Ve been looking for you everywhere. 
What the deuce has become of everybody ? 
Where have you been all the time? ” 

But woe for Tubby! If he had but 
known it, he had rudely interrupted Mad¬ 
den in one of the most eloquent, most criti¬ 
cal appeals of his life. 

The latter wheeled around upon his fat 
friend with an expression of ineffable 
disgust. 

“ What the devil! Where did you butt 
in from? Can’t you see that I’m—er— 
er—engaged? ” 

A delicious blush overspread Edith’s 
face. 

“Engaged!” repeated Tubby aghast, 
for he was of a sadly literal turn of mind, 
“ no—honest—is that so ? Gee—I—I 
beg pardon. I did n’t know what was do¬ 
ing, that is—er—er—excuse me!” 

Whereupon he retreated again in a 
tumult of confusion. When he had got 
well out of hearing he halted once more 


3H Brown of Harvard 

and proceeded to soliloquize as he had 
done previously—like to one who laments 
the fallen fortunes of his friends. 

“Fussing again! Nothing but fuss¬ 
ing. Everybody’s fussing. Gee whiz! 
Madden’s engaged! Well, if that isn’t 
the limit! What the deuce has got into 
the bunch, anyway? Oh, for one crack 
at Rammy’s! ” 

The merry whirl of dancers in the pa¬ 
vilion was a mockery—he did not dance. 
The joyous, chattering, giggling couples 
at the tables were a taunt—he did not 
“ fuss.” Once again he scrutinized them 
closely in the forlorn hope that he might 
meet with some familiar face—some 
friendly gesture that would make him a 
part and parcel of them. But he might as 
well have been cast away on a desert 
island. He was “ remote, unfriended, 
melancholy, slow.” 

With a sigh of genuine grief he turned 
his back upon the brilliantly illuminated 
Yard and sauntered slowly over toward 
the long tent where waiters were serving 
at somewhat more secluded tables. His 


Why Tubby was Lonesome 315 

appetite, ever of a practicable character, 
had been whetted by the punch, and as a 
last desperate resort he had determined 
to extract some slight solace from the 
all-dessert repast that constituted the 
“ spread.” 

As he stood looking about for a con¬ 
venient table he became aware of a 
voice engaged in a low, earnest whisper, 
apparently just at his side. The voice 
sounded familiar, though the owner 
thereof was effectually concealed by a 
dense screen of potted palms. Tubby 
stepped to the edge of the bower, and pok¬ 
ing his head around beyond the protecting 
fronds, started in surprise, and then pro¬ 
ceeded to stare in absorbed, open-eyed, 
full-blown curiosity. 

And well he might have stared. For 
there sat Tom—his own beloved Tom 
Brown; and opposite him, but very near 
him, sat Evelyn—the Evelyn who, Tubby 
had thought, was no longer even on speak¬ 
ing terms with her former sweetheart! 

Tom was speaking earnestly, very ear¬ 
nestly, his head bent over toward his com- 


3 l6 


Brown of Harvard 


panion, almost under the protective brim 
of the immense picture hat that she wore; 
his words came in whispers—eager, in¬ 
tense, voluble; and what he said ap¬ 
peared—from where Tubby peeked—to 
be of a pleading, persuading, appeal¬ 
ing character. And then—Tubby could 
scarce believe his eyes — Tom gently seized 
Evelyn’s unresisting hand — it was the left 
hand, even Tubby noticed that — and held 
it long and lovingly, palpably squeezing 
it from time to time while he continued his 
subdued, passionate, and no doubt elo¬ 
quent address. Next — horror upon hor¬ 
rors—he took something from his waist¬ 
coat pocket—Tubby could see it sparkling 
gorgeously in the gleam of the electric 
lights. 

It was too much for Tubby. The thing 
was beyond his comprehension. Tom— 
who by all rules of ethics should have 
been cast into utter darkness and dis¬ 
dained by this girl whom he had appar¬ 
ently so grievously wronged, was actually 
— visibly— He simply had to speak. The 
words welled to his lips involuntarily, al- 


Why Tubby was Lonesome 317 

most unconsciously, as if impelled by an 
irresistible force from within: 

(jr€6j you Ve got a nerve! ” 

Evelyn snatched her hand away in con¬ 
fusion, while Tom turned about abruptly 
upon the intruder. Catching sight of the 
round, saucer-eyed face of his chunky 
friend, his wrath exploded, and he burst 
into words of indignant, exasperated pro¬ 
test—words which, most miraculous to re¬ 
cord, were almost precisely the same as 
those recently employed by his chum 
Madden. 

“A nerve? Confound it— you've got 
a nerve! What are you everlastingly 
butting in for? Can’t you see that I’m 
—er—er—engaged? ” 

But Tubby waited to hear no more. 
He was dumbfounded—overwhelmed. 
Engaged! The thing was becoming epi¬ 
demic. In a daze he stumbled his way 
back to the punch table, threading his path 
once more between the tables and their 
chattering couples, past the groups of old 
grads who stood here and there survey¬ 
ing the animated scene with reminiscent, 


Brown of Harvard 


318 

and sometimes with strangely moist eyes; 
past the Right Reverend the Bishop of 
Massachusetts who, wearing a most un- 
ecclesiastical Panama hat, was conversing 
with a group of chaperons. 

He seized the glass of punch that was 
handed to him, and was about to gulp it 
down in one final effort to drown his rap¬ 
idly accumulating woe, when suddenly he 
paused, with the glass poised in mid-air, 
as an awful, a paralyzing, a hitherto un¬ 
dreamt-of thought struck him. For, 
whereas he had never been a 44 fusser ” 
himself, regarding girls as a more or less 
ornamental adjunct to the serious con¬ 
cerns of life, yet when he saw, as he had 
just seen, his dearest friends rapidly fad¬ 
ing away under the subtle influence of 
feminine charm, when he observed that 
fussing may and does develop into con¬ 
crete actualities, the dread conviction fell 
upon him with all the force of a deadly 
blow, that somehow, and some day, this 
same marvellous thing might happen to 
him—that there might be a girl some¬ 
where, even now existing in the wide 


Why Tubby was Lonesome 319 

world, upon whose finger he might event¬ 
ually, and with eager, earnest, whispered 
words, slip a- 

The thing was too awful to contem¬ 
plate. With a sickening shudder he 
gulped down his glass of punch. 


THE END* 




























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